Lagos State government has marked no fewer than 39 buildings located in two highbrow estates for demolition for building on the Right of Way, RoW, of Ikota River, at Eti-Osa Local Government Area. Ikota is part of the Maroko Okun Alfa Ward in the Lekki axis.
This is coming as the state government issued indefinite quit notices to affected occupants to enable them move their properties and families before the demolition exercise commences.
The affected buildings, located at Oral Extension Estate, Westend and Megamound Estate, Eti-Osa, LGA, include 20 buildings to be totally removed, eight marked for partial removal, while 13 buildings are to go down at Westend Estate.
Meanwhile, an enforcement team of the Ministry of Environment and Water Resources, commenced preliminary demolition when they poked the fences of some marked buildings in the estates.
Commissioner for the Environment and Water Resources, Tokunbo Wahab, who led the enforcement team to the site, while addressing newsmen, explained that government swung into action following a series of petitions on encroachment of the Ikota River.
Wahab said: “We had several complaints. We have been on this for a while now, and we found out at the ministry level that while we are engaging to find a win-win solution that will mitigate the negative impact on the environment and they don’t affect the people so much. Some developments were also going on to further push back the RoW, and the alignment of the Ikota River.
“So we had a digital footprint of the situation and we had to go there today. What we met on the ground is not good at all. It is not palatable. And we have told them these things. However, we want to allow them to move their things out. We have been to Oral Estate before now and you can not compare what we met last year, and what is now on ground.
“It shows that while they are engaging the government to find the solution to redesign some of their primary alignments and secondary collectors, they have also gone ahead to push further back the right of way for the Ikota River, and that is not good for anybody. So, we called the machines in and then we asked them to take all the walls and then push them back from further encroachment.
“We saw what was happening there too by the right of way on the other side of it. And then from there, we came to Megamound Estate. Now, what they are doing here as a reclamation, we also need to put them in check. If you’re doing a reclamation, the first thing you have to do before your reclamation is to obtain your drainage clearance and your environmental impact assessment document to be sure that the extension or reclamation you are seeking to do, if you have the approval at all, have a proper drainage alignment that will discharge and will not affect the ecosystem here. And we’ve asked them to stop. Now, beyond stopping, they have also pushed beyond the limits into the RoW.
“We have asked them to cut it off and push the sand back and then give us all the documents, stop working here, give us a document and we want to believe they’ll comply. And if they don’t, we will wield the big stick.”
On the number of buildings affected, Wahab said: “For the first stretch we have about 18 buildings. Then after the canal we have about 13 or so. But those ones are not full. They are the buildings behind the main buildings. That’s at Oral, and at Westerend, about eight.
“That’s what we have on the ground. But we also seek to engage them properly because now they are selling and divesting and giving titles to innocent buyers of value. So that’s why I say let those people who are innocent that had their kids in school so you don’t get their life disrupted because you want to enforce.
“They are not disputing the fact that something is wrong, they’re all admitted, but please give us time. Let us now find a way to reset ourselves. I know one or two of them personally, and I am going to keep telling them that this is not going to work.”
