The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola, has queried the criteria used to arrive at the Nigeria’s 17million housing deficit figure, saying that figure is not verifiable and accurate.
Some experts in the housing sector have for years be branding about with the humongous housing deficit figure and warned the government to urgently address the challenge.
Fashola, whon spoke recently in Gombe, however, advocated urbanisation policy, saying that the policy would address the problem confronting urbanization.
He said: “But before I continue, permit me to indulge those who spend their time on the debate about the size of the deficit and ask how educated and informed that debate is.
Who conducted the census that produced the figures in the Deficit? “Who verified the figures that now seem to trap many of our people in a vortex of difficulty? Does the deficit take into account the empty and unoccupied houses in every State of Nigeria? “Are these housing deficits in suburban, rural areas or in the urban centers? Why is there urbanization, and why is housing shortage a problem of urbanization? “It seems to me that as Policy Makers, before we even start to build houses, the first thing we can do is to address urbanization by policy”.
•••Says Buhari’s govt has increased works sector by N282bn The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola, has disclosed that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, has increased the annual budget of the works sector from N18 billion to N300billion.
With this fugure, the sector has witnessed an increase of N282billion since Buhari came on board in 2015.
Fashola, who spoke on Friday at a 3-day retreat organized for the senior staff in Calabar, Cross River state, also disclosed that Nigeria had no housing policy until May 2015 when President Mohammadu Buhari administration came into existence.
His administration, Fashola explained, had introduced a coordinated housing policy and housing schemes are being built in 34 states of the country.
He said: “I think I speak your minds if I say that there was no housing programme against three years ago and that today there is a national housing programme where we are building in thirty four states.
“ I think I speak your minds if I say against three years ago, all the budget the work sector had for building of roads in the whole country was 18 billion and today we have close 300 billion naira and the work sector can say there is no state in Nigeria we are not building road here or there” He said three years ago the story was that transmission was the biggest problem and that there was not enough power to supply the power sector grid , saying that there was not enough power to supply and averagely 2,690 megawatt was generated.
“The story has changed and generation has reached 7000 megawatts and 5,222 is being distributed, an all time national high.
Is there any one person who can say he did it on own.
Of course, the applause we are receiving from the public belongs to the entire team and the captain of our team President Buhari and the vice President”, the minister said.
He said emphasis should be on team work because he believes in the power of the team especially in public service.
The minster said the retreat organised to enable the public servants do more for the generality of the people.
