Kingsley U.N. Chikwendu —
At the just concluded 15th Abuja International Housing Show (AIHS) held at the International Conference Centre, Viewpoint had an interaction with Osilama Emmanuel Osilama, the CEO of Nuel Osilama Global Investments, a real estate firm that has been into estate business for close to two decades and has branches in Lekki, Lagos state and Benin City in Edo state. It also has a branch in the United Kingdom.
Also read: Views of Exhibitors at the Abuja International Housing Show
Osilama spoke to us on how affordable, estates produced by Nuel Osilama Global Investments are, the improving effects AIHS will have on housing conditions in the country and how far his role has been as the Chairman of REDAN, FCT. Excerpts:
On how affordable his estates are.
Basically, we provide both affordable and luxury houses. We always say we exist for every pocket. So, if you say you don’t have money, we have houses for you. If you are very rich, we also have houses for you.
You know affordability is basically about the end user, not the developer because, what is affordable to one person may not be affordable to another, it has a lot to do with capacity. We hve a benchmark, if it is within Abuja, we have for like 7-8 million naira, that is far away in Mararaba. We have a 1 bedroom, 2-bedroom and 3-bedroom far away in Angwan Dadi, on your way to Keffi. The landmark is Goshen church.
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Interested clients can pay an initial 50 per cent and spread the remaining balance across three years, but if you have a cooperative, in fact, it stretches beyond three years, you can go up to five years.
Thoughts on how the Abuja International Housing Show will improve housing conditions in the country.
The major thing the show is doing is attracting stakeholders under a single roof and when they interact, they synergise because there is also a CEO forum where they discuss ideas and come up with solutions to provide affordable houses. So, I would say in a long way, over the years, it has affected the cost of houses in Nigeria, but not drastically. You know we have a benchmark, we have a figure already that the Minister is trying to debunk, the issue of 17 million housing deficit. But, the fact that this event is holding every year, it has somehow enabled most of the major stakeholders to meet under an umbrella to look at the problems and provide solutions.
Your role as Chairman, REDAN, FCT, how has the experience been so far?
Interesting, one of the major things we have seen, which is a hiccup, an obstacle is that most of the agencies we are supposed to work with, their doors are not opened to us, this is the truth. Until they open their doors to us, we will not be able to make Abuja a conducive environment for investors. My request will be, they should try and open their doors to us so that Abuja will become an investment heaven for real estate investors because, we need to remove the bad eggs. We need to look for a way to identify the bad eggs in the industry, uproot them. For instance, we just set up a ten-man disciplinary committee to look out for those bad eggs that are giving a negative image to genuine estate developers, they go about doing fraudulent activities, defrauding unsuspecting Nigerians of their hard earned money. So, that committee is to look out and pick them, try to interact with them. Then, when they prove difficult, hand them over to anti-graft agencies to deal with them. Let the government just open their doors, all the relevant agencies, they know themselves.
