By SUNDAY ABBA, Abuja
Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Arc. Ahmed Musa Dangiwa, has charged the management of the ministry to think outside the box and come up with innovative measures and ideas that would help the ministry achieve its mandate of providing affordable housing, increasing access to land, and ensuring the sustainable development of urban and rural communities nationwide.
Arc. Dangiwa gave the directive while receiving briefs from the principal officers prior to the wide range of reforms he planned to bring to bear for the ministry to be properly repositioned for enhanced efficiency and performance towards making the desired impact in line with its mandate, disclosed a statement signed by Mark Chieshe, the Minister’s SA on Media and Publicity, and made available to SUMMIT POST
According to Dangiwa, the ministry, which is mostly staffed by professional architects and town planners, must take the lead in researching and developing housing designs that are actually affordable and accessible to Nigerians, particularly the low and medium-income earners, who constitute over 80% of the Nigerian population.
“As a ministry staffed mostly with professional Architects, we must use our knowledge and expertise to produce innovative housing designs that are affordable and livable. We must prioritise the 80% of Nigerians that are within the low to medium income segment. They too are Nigerians and deserve to live in decent, safe, and quality homes” he said.
To this end, the Minister immediately set up a Committee on Affordable Housing Design and tasked its members to develop a minimum of three different housing concepts that an average Nigerian can afford.
He directed that the conceptual designs should be organic, i.e. a family can start with a one bedroom and as their income increases expand that same house to a two bedroom or three bedrooms over time on the same parcel of land by attaching one or two walls as the case may be.
Describing what an affordable house is, Dangiwa said it is reasonably priced within the financial reach of low income individuals and families, adding that such a house should not cost more than 30% of a household’s income, rent or mortgage payments, utilities and maintenance costs inclusive, such that its preferred cost is within the range of N4 to N7 million
The Minister also assigned the Urban and Regional Planning Directorate the task of collaborating with the National Assembly to formulate an actionable framework for initiating the review of the Land Use Act of 1978 as it is crucial for facilitating affordable housing delivery.
The Minister noted that the Land Use Act contains outdated provisions and no longer fully serves its original purpose due to the passage of time.
All directives were given specific timelines within which to be implemented.