THE Senate on Tuesday adopted a recommendation which asked the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Senator Adamu Aliero, to revoke land allocations made by former Minister of the FCT, Mallam Nasiru el-Rufai, to the farm of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Obasanjo Farms Limited, on the eve of the former president’s departure from office.


The Senate accepted the recommendation of its Joint Committee on Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and Housing which recommended that plots of land allocated to former President Obasanjo, which originally belonged to the Universal Basic Education (UBE), be revoked and returned to Inter-projects, which was initially allocated the land.


Also recommended for revocation were 3, 645 plots of lands allocated by el-Rufai, between May 17, 2007 and May 29, 2007. The recommendation was also accepted at the Senate hearing on Tuesday.


While accepting other recommendations, the Senate also stated that all land revocations and allocations made by the former minister in the last 30 days of his tenure as the minister of the FCT should be revisited and reviewed by the present minister.


According to the Chairman of the Committee, Senator Abubakar Sodangi, who presented the report, Mallam el-Rufai, within that time, acted without authority to do so, as “he had become functus officio” because the Federal Executive Council (FEC) had been dissolved by that time.


The Senate also directed the FCT administration to restore all the plots belonging to the Federal Government’s ministries and parastatals agencies which were revoked by the el-Rufai administration.


Also, the Senate directed the FCT administration to restore all the lands revoked by the previous administration on which there were subsisting court orders and all the revocations that contravened the Land Use Decree.


On the findings of the committee, Senator Sodangi said: “That the immediate past minister of the FCT, Mallam el-Rufai, allocated 4, 352 plots in less than 30 days to his exit as minister. That the breakdown of allocation made in the last two weeks of his leaving office shows that he signed out 3,645 plots and on the last day of Obasanjo administration, on 29 May, 2007, the minister signed out 655 plots, even when the cabinet had been dissolved on 16 May, 2007 by the former President Olusegun Obasanjo.


“The committee finds this action to be reckless and without due authority of office. The former Minister of FCTA, Mallam el-Rufai, revoked land allocation without due process as the memorandum which he approved for the revocations was written by persons not authorised by the law, namely, Ezeamaka Cyril and Babatunde Olajide, his personal Assistants.”