Worried by the menace of land grabbers, the Lagos state House of Assembly Tuesday agreed to organise a public hearing as part of ways of finding urgent solutions to the worrisome situation.
The planned stakeholders’ meeting would be all-encompassing as it would involve the state government, the police, the judiciary, traditional rulers and others.
Speaker of the House, Mudashiru Obasa, said land grabbing has become “a serious issue that has become disturbing. It is chaotic. Many people have been killed, some maimed and some locked up without trial just because of the existence of some people who have turned themselves to land grabbers.”
Dr. Obasa frowned at cases where land speculators write petitions and with the connivance of security officials, the real owners of the properties are arrested, taken to Abuja and forced to sign undertakings that would bar them from the same land they bought.
He said the land grabbers often attack new and developing areas in Ikorodu, Epe, Ojo and others and added: “I wonder how somebody would just invade people’s properties and still exude such boldness and confidence, kill the owner or bring police.”
Obasa, recalled his own experience sometimes ago and added: “What do you think of the fate of a resident who struggles to own a property, struggle to start building on it only for somebody to just suddenly take over the land making life difficult for him?”
