Viewpoint —
At least, five thousand and seventy (5,070) houses of different choices are ready for ownership by subscribers across Nigeria who applied for the Federal Government National Housing Programme.
An overview of the National Housing Programme document accessed by the Tribune Online stated that the Ministry of Works and Housing had completed over 2,000 houses as awaited owners take over for pay, park in and occupy.
It reads: “the Ministry is undertaking the construction of 5,692 housing units in 45 sites, out of which 2,465 units have been completed in 35 States and FCT. From these over 2000 houses, over 70 units would be launched in Nasarawa state.
Construction work has yet begun in Lagos State,” the document maintained, this, Nigerian Tribune learnt was due to lack of access to land from the state government.
These houses were designed, constructed and developed by the Federal Government’s National Housing Programme which began in 2016, with an initial allocation of N35,600,000,00 in the Appropriation Act.
Tribune Online can exclusively report that the programme, driven by the Economic Recovery Growth Plan (ERGP) initiative of the federal government has had the investment of N143,782,982,931 budgetary allocation between 2016 and 2021.
It can also report that, Nigerians in Nasarawa state, who subscribed to the National Housing Programme, would this week have 76 units of houses available to them, to own, based on their choices, as the federal Government launches, 76 housing units in Nasarawa State, as part of the official launch and commissioning of the projects spread in three phases across Nigeria.
Tribune Online learnt that after the Nasarawa launch, the completed housing units in Edo, Delta, Imo and Osun would follow among others as the projects are being executed in 35 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
Subscribers for the National Housing programmes are Nigerians who logged on to the website and registered their interest to own houses under the scheme.
Further checks by Tribune Online showed that 5,692 units of houses have reached various levels of completion across 45 sites in Nigeria, on which Nigerians are expected to make payment of between N9.2m for one-bedroom semi-detached houses to N16.4m for three-bedroom houses.
The programme design noted the cultural peculiarity of Northern Nigeria and houses in the region were built with a courtyard which resulted in price differential for 2-bedroom houses in the region higher, at N12.3m for semi-detached houses while its southern structure for the same 2-bedroom goes for N10.8m.
Already, over 15,000 Nigerians have applied for the programme, Tribune Online learnt. Out of these, three subscribers, who have fully made payments on their successful applications, for outright purchase, have successfully taken ownership of their houses in Oyo, FCT and Kwara respectively.
In direct compliance to the presidential executive order five-part of which stated that: “Procuring entities shall give preference to Nigerian companies and firms in the award of contract, in line with the Public Procurement Act 2007.
“MDAs shall ensure that before the award of any contract, Nigerian counterpart staff are engaged from the conception stage to the end of the project.
“The MDAs shall adopt local technology to replace foreign ones, where they meet set standards. and also the Federal Government shall introduce Margin of Preference in National Competitive Bidding, in the evaluation of tenders, from indigenous suppliers of goods manufactured locally over foreign goods.
The National Housing Programme complied with this, and engaged 1,215 contractors to execute the project whose daily activities in the various sites had 14,000 new jobs indirect employment.
The project also created labour through indirect employment which is generated and sustained. This reached 50,000 jobs in Nigeria, across the 45 sites which covered the first, second and third phases of the projects targeted at reduction of housing need in the country.
It also gathered that in compliance with presidential executive order 5 which directed promotion and patronage of local content, the Ministry of Works and Housing engaged stakeholders in the built industry and revived some of the local manufacturing outfits that have gone under to provide materials for the construction and finishing of these houses.
In a document sighted by the Nigerian Tribune reporter, tagged “An Overview of the National Housing Programme” it reads that: “The use of available local building materials in the NHP has stimulated the economy through the production and use of these materials. The overall economic value chain arising from the housing construction activities is mostly beneficial to the Nigerian youths.
“The philosophy behind the NHP is the provision of a pilot housing scheme that is affordable, accessible, and acceptable as contained in the National Housing Policy.
“The approach to the design and use of materials take cognizance of the cultural and climatic peculiarities of the regions while responding also to the tenets of the Building Energy and Efficiency Code being championed by the Ministry,” it stated.
“The document further said: “A total of 1,215 Building Contractors have been engaged under Phases I, II and III of the Programme since inception in 2016 and 14,500 and 50,140 direct and indirect jobs have been generated.”
This reactivated some local manufacturing concerns in tiles, toilet seats, roofing sheets and other aspects that grew the industry locally.
Tribune Online learnt that the National Housing Programme stimulated local industry one of which was the stabilized earth technology and the local bricks production.
This aspect of the project showed huge promise but was stunted by low technology and poor market acceptability for the use of bricks for what architects in the project described as a “facade” for the construction of houses.
The challenge has been described as a massive local opportunity for Nigeria’s built industry by the Director, Public Building Housing, Federal Ministry of Works and Housing, and National Housing Programme, (NHP) Architect, Solomon Labafilo.
He said the market created by the National Housing Programme for the earth stabilizer would drive thousands of jobs, where the Nigerian scientific community would do more research on the technology to promote its availability and acceptability among Nigerians for that input of the local industry.
Tribune Online findings showed that in its determined effort to provide affordable housing to Nigerians, the Federal Ministry of Housing has invested N143,782,982,931, this amount excluded the budgetary allocation for the national housing Programme in the 2022 fiscal year.
For the 2022 fiscal year, under the Economic Recovery Growth Plan it reads: “(ERGP27168391) federal government national housing programme nationwide ongoing N14,023,826,978.”
The respective annual provision which had a cumulative of N143,782,982,931 for six years is in 2021 “ERGP27154670 federal government national housing programme nationwide ongoing N11,991,487,952.”
For 2020 it reads: ERGP27140433 federal government national housing programme nationwide, ongoing, N16,570,000,000″
The federal government in 2019 budgeted for “ERGP27127240 federal government national housing programme nationwide, ongoing, N24,968,089,687
It was captured in the 2018 budget as ERGP27105974 federal government national housing programme nationwide ongoing N26,653,405,292.
FMOWP42970723 “federal government national housing programme nationwide N28,000,000,000.”
In 2016, when the project started, it was tagged FMWPH004021474 construction of 1,973 blocks of 7,068 housing units in the 6 geo-political zones and the FCT, the new project had the seed fund of N35,600,000,000, which continued to witness a decline from 2016 to 2021.
The Tribune
