Lagos Residents To Resist Demolition Of Houses

Occupants of Jakande Estate located in Ejigbo in Lagos State have vowed to resist the state government’s plan to demolish 50 houses in the estate which failed the integrity test conducted by the government on the structures.

The occupants of some of the buildings marked for demolition told LEADERSHIP WEEKEND that they had nowhere to go
One of the owners of the affected blocks, who identified himself as Mr. Samson Adeyanju, said: ”The buildings have been marked for demolition, we agreed. But the question is where do we go and live with our families?Where is the government providing for us?

The buildings are no illegal structures. The arrangements have not been concluded. We will stay here and face their bulldozers when they bring them to make us homeless.”

The state government, which is bent on going ahead with the exercise,? said the demolition of the 50 houses, (two and three-storey buildings) was because they failed the integrity test conducted on them by the Lagos State Raw Materials Testing Agency after a two-storey building collapsed in the estate in November 2012, killing two sisters.

LEADERSHIP WEEKEND learnt that at a stakeholder’s meeting organised by the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA), which was presided over by its General Manager, Dr. Femi Oke-Osayintolu, he told the residents that the buildings had failed integrity test and needed to be demolished to avert any disaster.