Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Barr Nyesom Wike has vowed to collect over N34 billion owed the FCT Administration.
Wike made this vow while speaking to members of the House of Representatives Adhoc Committee to Investigate Failure of Mass Transportation in Nigeria, during a working visit in his Area 11, Garki, Abuja office on Tuesday.
The minister warned allottees owing the Administration for ground rents to either pay or have their property revoked and reallocated to those who could pay.
His words: “I have calculated the debt of non-payment of ground rent, which is about N34 billion and I am going to collect all of those back. I don’t care, all I want is for the rent to be paid.
“We will be publishing on Thursday for all those who are meant to pay their ground rent. They will be given the grace of two weeks to pay.
“Whoever doesn’t pay, I’ll revoke it and give it to whoever will pay so that the necessary services will be rendered. People want to live in a beautiful city but don’t want to pay their dues; which is impossible.”
Reacting to why Lagos was succeeding in public transportation but Abuja is not, Wike explained that Lagos is a state while the “FCT is like a State”, stressing that budgetary provision for the FCT is poor.
On the Abuja Urban Mass Transport Company (AUMTCO), he said: “The truth of the matter is that, am gonna overhaul the entire system.”
He disclosed that N2 billion was approved for palliatives by President Bola Tinubu for FCT in the federal government’s subsidy programme and his “concern was transportation, but I need to know where are we.”
Chairman of the House of Representatives Ad-hoc Committee, Afam Victor Ogene, stated that his committee visited the minister to find solutions to epileptic mass transportation in the country and FCT after over N16 billion had been put into it during SURE-P.
“We are here to encourage you to also look into transportation to organise it. We will support you to do it and it will also solve problems of one chance in the city”, he pledged.
