By Ayoni M. Agbabiaka
Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) has inaugurated a committee on urban and regional tribunal to adjudicate on matters of contravention of land between FCTA and the developers.
Members of the tribunal, Engr. Sani Haliru, Akhigbe Irenen, Arc. Gabe Adimorah and Aliyu Yawuri, which will be chaired by Prince Ebenezer Oluseyi Lufade, were sworn in by the Chief Judge of FCT High Court, Ibrahim Bukar, represented by Justice Salisu.
While inaugurating the committee yesterday in his office, Minister of FCT, Senator Bala Mohammed, said after the relocation of seat of government from Lagos to FCT in 1976, a master plan was developed to serve as a comprehensive frame work for the development of the city.
He said despite the successes, the attraction of Abuja as a city of opportunities has created a massive internal migration of Nigerians to the city, resulting to “unauthorised developments, changes in land uses, traffic congestion, inadequacy in waste management, etc., presently exerting a lot of pressure on the city infrastructure and the maintenance of the integrity of the master plan”.
The minister said it was against this background that the FCT administration decided to undertake the effort of creating appropriate institutions that would guarantee the orderly development and the management of the territory.
He said the tribunal, which was established under the Nigeria Urban and Regional Planning Act 1992 Cap 138 LFN 2004, would assist in the enforcement of standards and regulations, settle disputes arising from resettlement issues and act generally as an alternative dispute resolution in development.
He further said that the tribunal was first established in 1990 but could not take off operationally due to legal constraints, but a committee was reconstituted in 2008 with a new operational framework approved and gazetted by the then Attorney General of the FCT.
