Two weeks ago, residents of Karmajiji were thrown into confusion following alleged demolition threat by the Development Control Department of Abuja Metropolitan Management Council, (AMMC). CHIKA OKEKE looks at the present state of affairs.
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Karmajiji community is home to Nigeria’s Fallen Heroes and also to the beggars colony. Due to its strategic location, any visitor to the FCT will be quick to discover that the mass grave yard of Nigeria’s fallen heroes is the first point of call at Karmajiji, which is a few kilometers away from the city gate. Notwithstanding the nature of the village, FCT residents have continued to find solace in the village. It is dominated by Gwandara natives and other settlers especially the Hausa.
Investigations by LEADERSHIP SUNDAY revealed that a good number of houses in the village have? the inscription GDS, stamped on their walls. The only government primary school in the community was donated by AMAC in 2009. Toilet facilities are also virtually non-existent as the residents defecate in the open and litter the surroundings with wrapped excreta and other filth including discarded pet and broken glass bottles. The pathways are not spared of the faeces- litter.
Miss Raliat Usman, a kogi-born seamstress was busy with her dress making? enterprise despite the panic in the village. The hype followed reports that Development Control officials are around to effect the demolition of some houses in the village when this reporter visited the community. “Are you talking of renting a house here when they want to demolish this village? Raliat asks. “It’s been making the rounds for sometime now that they will demolish.? They also claim that the (FCDA) gave the chief of the community notice that they will carry out demolish here today (Tuesday), but you cannot trust what people say all the time. While some say that non- indigene’s houses will be demolished, others insist that those belonging to indigenes will not be touched and yet another set say that it’s all the houses that will be demolished.
Nobody knows the truth for now and I am not sure of your chances of renting a house at this moment”. She said without commitment. You can squat with somebody for now if you can find one till when the demolition matter is over. As I am now, I’m just praying to God to shield us because we don’t know what will happen next. Anybody coming to look for a house now, does that at his or her own risk.
The same goes for Mr. Akeem Bello who was seen working aggressively on a new 3 single rooms apartment which he claimed belongs to his brother. Though he did not mention the brother’s name but was only interested in giving out the rooms on rent and based on urgent down payment.
“The house belongs to my brother but we want urgent payment. It is N70,000 per annum though people have been coming that they want to pay N50,000 but we cannot rent it out at that amount. It is a new building except for the old houses that go for N40,000 to N50,000. Though we have not connected electricity to the house for now, we will still have to do that because our transformer broke down.
The Chief of Karmajiji, Haruna Koko, who is a Gwandara by tribe, was seated on his royal chair meditating over what transpired with AMMC staff when LEADERSHIP SUNDAY called at the palace. He spoke through, Adamu Mohammed who also doubles as the “Ciroman Karmajiji” interpreted his statements. He says, “AMMC officials came for the new houses that our children just built. They said that some people who were not supposed to own plots were illegally given lands to build their own houses. I want to state that the new houses in the village belong to the chief’s children. Between the last demolition in 2006 and today, some of our children have grown up and they cannot continue living with their parents so they decided to build their own houses. Development control officials saw the houses, thinking that we sold the lands to non-indigenes. We cannot sell land again because we are not government and they (government) had warned us seriously to stop selling lands but with a proviso that only our children can build new houses.
Before they left with a promise to come again, we told them that we don’t want resettlement but to be integrated into the Abuja master plan. We are the indigenes and are supposed to get the benefits of our soil. We cannot be ejected from this village while our ancestors remain here. The graves of our fore fathers, our culture and everything about us are here, are we supposed to leave them? Has such thing ever happened in any other state other than Abuja? The answer is no. What government is supposed to do here is to concentrate on providing social amenities like electricity and good roads. We have a primary school but there are not enough teachers in the school. There is no single hospital here and whatever happens, you will take your child to town for treatment and may be before you seek medical treatment in the town, somebody might die on the way which is very bad. We are appealing to the government to hear our cry and help. We cannot fight with government but we are only appealing for integration and to be provided social amenities. If there are social amenities here, people cannot run from the village to go and over stretch those in the city.?
Did the AMMC actually serve any notice to the villagers about their proposed demolition plans? “They did not serve us any notice except that they sent a three-man delegate to visit the chief and possibly mark the houses; and fix a date when they will come with their bulldozer for demolition. They had earlier held a meeting with all the traditional rulers at Zone 6 where they were informed about the pending demolition.
Actually, we prevailed on them at the meeting to revisit the demolition issue.
On the lepers colony, the Chief of Karmajiji noted, “They (lepers) have been there for several years and nobody is taking care of them. They are all living in the batcher and their living conditions are very bad. Human beings ought not to live in such places and I think that government should do something about it. At least government should re-access their conditions. Do you know that before the community road was graded, we went cap in hand to a Chinese company and Julius Berger to beg them for assistance, they graded the road free of charge last year and government did no such thing for us? In 2006, they demolished all the private hospitals here and since then, we have not had access to health care services except for petty patent medicine stores. Last year, we had only one transformer serving the entire village but this year, AMAC gave us another one. The first has packed up and the only functional transformer cannot serve one quarter of the residents. Now we are in the dry season and children don’t like heat. For the adults, we may decide to sleep outside but what about the children. Even if they decide to demolish the houses by force, we cannot fight or stop them from doing their work. If we fight them, it might escalate to a big crisis and we may not know the end. The only thing we can do is to send our complaints to other authorities in charge for proper investigation.
The Public Relation Officer, Development Control department of Abuja Metropolitan Management Council, (AMMC) Mrs. Josie Mudashiru told LEADERSHIP SUNDAY that the monitoring team went round the FCT to ascertain if the traditional rulers adhered to the instruction given by the FCT minister of state, Olajumoke Akinjide concerning shady land deals between the traditional rulers and the villagers.
According to her, “Our monitoring team went round the FCT in furtherance of the meeting that the FCT Minister of State held with the traditional rulers to make sure that they are adhering to what was agreed at the meeting concerning illegal sale of lands in the villages. They did not mark any house for demolition today. What they did at Karmajiji was that they discovered that some chiefs were still in the business of selling out lands. They held a meeting with the traditional ruler because they needed some people from the palace to take them round and identify the new structures that were built in the village. The traditional ruler pleaded with our team to give them more time because the people that will take them round the village were not available. The inspection visit has been rescheduled for tomorrow.
The plans by the FCT administration to rid the city of shanties may result in a ripple effect if deliberate efforts are not made to increase the number of housing units for the masses at affordable rates.
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