[size=14pt]Each day, I feel like committing suicide [/size]
, Says man whose bakery was demolished by Lagos State govt
Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Until that fateful day in May this year, Joseph Adewoye, chairman and chief executive officer of Uncle Joe Bakery in Ajegunle area of Lagos, could never have envisaged the cruel fate that was to be his lot. But since May 2, 2008 when his bakery was demolished by the bulldozers of Governor Babatunde Fashola’s task force on illegal structures, life has become a bitter pill.





The demolition, he says, has denied him and his family their means of livelihood, keeping them in perpetual state of hunger and impoverishment.

Since the incident, suicide, he confides in Daily Sun, has never been too far away from his mind. What keeps discouraging him from taking the fatal plunge into the lagoon is the strange feeling that the government will soon do something to ameliorate the suffering of his family, he says.

“Since the demolition of my bakery, my family has been suffering. I have not been doing anything. I’m now so abjectly poor that I cannot feed my family. It is difficult to believe this, but it is true. The demolition has suddenly turned me into a beggar. I find it difficult to train my children in school. I’m tired of this sinful world. At times, I feel like committing suicide but something in my heart keeps telling me that the government would soon come to our aid. So, I just keep praying.

“I must tell you that I have already lost hope in life. Unless the government does something, I’m finished. The frustration in life is so much. I’m now a laughing stock and each time I remember this, the idea of committing suicide would come to my mind.

According to him, even his erstwhile tenants have turned him into an object of contempt.

“A man who rented some square metres of my land where he breaks and sells firewood was owing me one year and six months rent. He was paying N1,200 per month. But after the demolition, he told me straight to my face that he was no longer going to pay me since the land belongs to the state government. When he said that, I felt so bad because I bought the land with my money and got clearance from the local government. But for my tenant to tell me to go to hell, that the land does not belong to me gave me sleepless nights. He is still using my land without paying me.”

His efforts to dispose his N25 million baking machines to raise some money have also been unfruitful. “My machines worth about N25 million are still lying outside at the mercy of criminals. I don’t have where to keep them. They are too big. You cannot keep them in a room. I’m ready to sell them but I have not seen anybody interested in buying them,” he laments.

Adewoye says he harbours no ill feelings against the Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola. All he wants is some compensation. “I’m not against government policy. But I’m saying this because it has affected my means of livelihood so badly. My brother, I cannot sleep in the night. I will be thinking till the next day. No matter how hard I tried to sleep, it would not work and I now depend on sleeping tablets.”

The baker described his wife as a mere petty trader whose business is grossly inadequate to feed the family. He says whatever savings he made in his bakery business have since gone into the education of his three children.

“I have been begging now to get money to feed my family. You can see how life changes. Now I can only go and look at where I packed my machines and go home,” Adewoye says.


http://odili.net/news/source/2008/aug/27/501.html

Nigeria!!!!

sorry oh

Men but the truth is who are we going to blame, is it the man that built a property in the wrong place or the government that is just rememberin to restructure after a long time. I think the Gov shld re-compensate him but how much Oga sorry o! Did u vote for Babatunde Fashola? If u did den ur good deed is comin back to hurt u but if u didn't den he is punishin u for not votin for him. either way man, God dey. Cast all of ur cares on Him ok

I think govt would have some found to compesate some pple for not just the land, but even the value of what they build on the land.
This is the second person i heard of, and i think it is sad and ridiculous, i guess he is trying to be another Rufai of Abuja.

Men but the truth is who are we going to blame, is it the man that built a property in the wrong place or the government that is just rememberin to restructure after a long time. I think the Gov shld re-compensate him but how much Oga sorry o! Did u vote for Babatunde Fashola? If u did den your good deed is comin back to hurt u but if u didn't den he is punishin u for not votin for him. either way man, God dey. Cast all of your cares on Him ok

Good point, but the problem in Nigeria is that most citizens do not know the right and wrong place because most of these properties were sold to them by the government themselves.

very sad.

However, cant he start another bakery business? Even if he has to do it right there in his room or backyard, until he gets more stable.

The government really should try to compensate people whose homes were demolished.

Demolition fever spurs house renovation in Lagos



Apart from insecurity occasioned by daily robbery incidents, erratic power supply and flooding, the other major problem confronting Lagos State is no doubt building collapse. Hardly does a month pass without the state witnessing a gory incident of collapsed building with its attendant loss of lives. Sometimes, such incidents are witnessed twice in a week. In fact, the frequency at which buildings collapse in the state assumed a frighteningly phenomenal dimension that the government had no other choice than to intervene and take decisive actions to stop the ugly trend.

This informs the recent setting up of the Technical Committee On Planning Regulation and Building Control.


After intense brainstorming, the committee came up with the policy document to permanently address the problem and other developmental issues, such as rapid growth of slums and flooding. According to the committee, the policy is specifically intended to attain objectives in the areas of planning administration, community regeneration, New Town Integration and Building Collapse and Control.


The document code-named 'Lagos Habitat 2011', which has been submitted to the government and approved by Governor Babatunde Fashola, requires, among other things, that all buildings in the state are subjected to test to determine their structural reliability, the outcome of which will decide which of the buildings will be left standing and the ones that will go under the bulldozers.


Thus in the past weeks, fear of demolition has gripped many a landlord in the state, especially those whose houses have aged and urgently in need of renovation but the owners thought otherwise. Mostly hit in this regime of fear are landlords whose houses are built in areas, such as Ajeromi-Ifelodun, Mainland, Yaba, Mushin and Lagos Island local government areas, among others. Initially, the government's resolve was taken as a pinch of salt by many landlords who termed it as the usual pronouncement that would only enjoy airtime without concrete implementation and then fizzle out just like that. They were however jolted out of their wishful thinking when the task force on the implementation of the policy went to work few weeks ago. For instance, a storey building at Jones Waribi Street in Wilmer Area of Ajeromi-Ifelodun Local Government Area was turned to smithereens last week for failing the test and posing danger to the people. Another storey building at Oluwa Street almost went the same way save for the quick response of the owners who swung into action immediately it dawned on her that Alausa was serious about the matter. She was said to have been given a warning notice to renovate the house without delay.


As it is now, the fear of demolition is the beginning of wisdom for the landlords in some parts of Lagos where substandard or unplanned buildings dot every part of the settlements. Apart from fortifying their houses with iron rods and concretes and taking proper care of the cracks on the walls, among other fundamental structural amendments, the house owners also try as much as possible to ensure that their houses wear new looks by splashing them with paints. Those who even believe their houses need no major renovation still plaster them with 'new colour' as a sign of compliance. And the bug seems to have bitten all of them, though some are doing it grudgingly and out of fear.


"This are unbudgetted expenses. It is like temptation, but there is nothing we can do because I heard that they have started demolishing houses of those who do not comply. So I have to do it before they come here," lamented a landlord while renovating his house at Wilmer.


Commenting on the development, an estate agent, Frank Akindele, hailed the policy as one of the best that has come out of the numerous policies of the government aimed at transforming the state and the orientation of its people.


"This is one of the best policies of the state government. Lagos has had enough of collapsed buildings. If you look at the root cause of it, it is either greed on the part of the landlords or the so-called developers. Many landlords are just interested in their rents while many developers want to make more money while building a house. They are less concerned about the welfare of the occupiers," he said.


However, developers as well as producers of building materials, such as blocks, may henceforth have their skin peeled whenever incidence of collapsed building occurs in the state unlike before when they easily dissociate themselves and go scot-free. The technical committee advocated the strict compliance with the use of professionals in building while the products should be branded. These moves are to allow for easy trace of the so-called professionals and the makers of the building products to account for their sins or complicity.


However, demolition of buildings as expected will never go down well with many people, but according to the Lagos State House of Assembly Chairman, House Committee on Physical Planning and Urban Development, Mufutau Egberongbe, it is better than destruction of lives.


"It is not that the state government derives any pleasure in demolishing people's houses, but at the same time it cannot afford to watch its citizens perish as a result of building collapse. We would prefer people to be mere homeless than to die in wreckage of a collapsed building," the lawmaker said in an interview with Daily Independent over demolition of illegal structures.


Investigations revealed that Lagos Island seems to have an edge over other parts of the state in the calamity called collapsed buildings. This much was expressed by some concerned Islanders when within one week two incidents were recorded late last year.


"Many houses in this Island are just standing; they can collapse anytime. For example, the house at number 91, Olushi Street, and 45 Apatira Street are not strong at all," complained Alhaji Liadi Iyanda, the secretary of the Community Development Association (CDA), while lamenting the fate that befell house number 15, Okepopo Street in the Island in which a day-old boy miraculous escaped death but his mother was not that lucky, as she was killed with her guests.


Also speaking on the state of building in the Island, Odunayo Ilo, a resident, maintained that "people that build houses here on the Island do not build them with caution; they economise too much in terms of money and materials while building the houses. There are many houses like this (the collapsed one) in this area. In fact, a lot of buildings around here are sub-standard. Not less than a month ago, something like this happened. The government should intervene in the construction of houses, especially in the Island here," he said.


Well, the heat is on now; whether such lamentations will be confined to the dustbin of history or not.



http://odili.net/news/source/2008/aug/28/709.html