4th February, 2014
On Monday Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola inaugurated the Lagos State Housing Ownership Mortgage Scheme, HOMS, at the Banquet Hall of Lagos House, Alausa, Ikeja. This, according to the government, is a stimulus package for supported access to home ownership for residents of Lagos State.
This is a welcome development as this scheme will benefit low income earners who will be given opportunity of repayment for 10 years. While launching the scheme on Monday Fashola said his government had taken the view that a home is not something you buy in one day but over time. Good idea.
Fashola said the easiest way to go about it would have been to simply sell all the houses, collect the cash and wait for the next batch and do the same, “but this is not our way.” He added that this simplistic way does not solve the problem of housing. “For us, sustainability is the key and I have personally benefitted from previous initiatives by my esteemed predecessor (Alhaji Lateef Jakande) in this regard,” he said. Good talk.
But at the occasion, many subscribers who applied for the Egan/Igando Housing Scheme wanted to ask the governor why his government has failed to deliver on the Egan/Igando project. They were not allowed. We want to believe that Governor Fashola was not part of this conspiracy.
We are, therefore, compelled to bring to his notice the failure of the Lagos State Building Investment Company, LBIC, to deliver on its promises of the allocation of Egan/Igando Housing Scheme to subscribers who have fully paid for the scheme that was actually planned in 2008 to be completed and delivered under 12 months. Nothing has happened.
Subscribers were subjected to two verification exercises to authenticate their payment claims.There is now a growing concern by the subscribers that the project may have been abandoned. To assure these subscribers who have waited for over five years now, the Egan/Igando Scheme and others in that category should be collapsed into the new Lagos Home Ownership Scheme. Otherwise, the government should refund the money already paid by subscribers.