₦airaland Forum

The key to understanding Lagos, Africa’s most populous city, is in the water.

And since 2008, it is to the sea that an ambitious development company has looked for an unorthodox fix to the problems that plague Lagos including joblessness and housing shortages: a brand new city, built on land clawed back from the bottom the ocean floor.

Eko Atlantic is the name of a grandiose project to create a new economic capital for Africa—notably, right next to the current economic capital for Africa. The development includes everything from sky-scrapers to luxury apartments, a new financial district, a private power-grid, and a shopping boulevard in the image of New York’s Fifth Avenue. It’s the brainchild of the Chagoury brothers, two Nigerian-born billionaires of Lebanese descent who own South Energyx Nigeria Ltd, a real estate development company created to build out Eko Atlantic.

Eko Atlantic is meant to be an antidote to Lagos’s deepest recession in 30 years. The city is meant to bring 250,000 new jobs and address a housing shortage brought on by a surging population. This, and the fact that it’s privately-funded, have lent it the support of the state and federal governments. It’s being sold to investors as “a valuable foothold in Africa” one of the world’s last emerging growth markets.

But what makes Eko Atlantic’s development especially noteworthy is its location. The planned city borders Lagos directly. Eko Atlantic was built by dredging up and filling in 9 kilometers (about 5.6 miles) worth of land. Before the project began in 2008, the peninsula was non-existent.

The result is that Eko Atlantic has the appearance of being an island created out of thin air. Satellite imagery highlights just how dramatic an effect the construction — which is far from finished — has had on Lagos’ coast.

There were no responses to requests for comment from the team behind Eko Atlantic. But for Lagos, a city composed of a series of islands, the situation Blumberg describes could be disastrous. Lagos’ surrounding areas are not only unprotected by the wall, but are lower in sea level than Eko Atlantic. It’s a combination that leaves the old city of Lagos and its hundreds of years of history startlingly vulnerable.

If the critics are correct, Eko Atlantic might provide parts of Lagos with yet another link to the sea, one rooted in potential danger and unknowable risk. To the sea parts of the city may return.

“With sea walls, you have to figure out what you’re protecting against,” Dr. Blumberg advised. In the case of Lagos and Eko Atlantic, the better question might be who gets the protection.

hahn:
Lalasticlala there is a snake on this thread

Blue3k:
Nobody cares because it's not sensational. Just numbers facts and data instead of tribalism and political drama.

For those that want to read and analyse the "Vision 2020" of the Buhari/Osinbajo administration for themselves, feel free to download the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan from the Fed. Min. of Budget National Planning website:

agabaI23:
Yes bto. I be don dey look for you since after election but it appears levels changed. Thanks for the change you preached.

agabaI23:
From Junaid Mohamed.

You should all talk about this

Bevista:
Unfortunately, this narrative has been going on for sometime now. I really don't know if this is a product of ignorance or just a way of undermining the efforts of the administration.
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How much has been recovered and how far can that solve Nigeria's problems? The FG gave aggregate bailout funds of nearly N500B to the states, yet that has not even scratched the problem. FG even gave another round of funds to states as refunds from debts over-deductions, yet it still looks like nothing is happening.
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The fact is that most of us have no inkling about the enormity of the challenges facing the country. Sink N20Trillion into this economy today, and I can assure you we will still not make much progress (come to think of it, N20T is just equivalent to South Africa's annual budget).
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The recovered funds is less than N200B and yet we keep talking about the FG not needing to borrow, or how it should end recession.

hahn:
LRNZH, do you still feel the same about Buhari?

Wike said :“That one that cannot pay salaries to his workers for almost one year? That one that Fulani herdsmen have almost finished his people and he cannot do anything? Do you want to be like Benue?‎”

Gov. Wike also advised Ortom to go back to his State and rescue Benue people from the shackles of Fulani Herdsmen and other insurgents who are “killing people like flies”.

Some firsts are expected, or at least not surprising:
Sweden is #1 in pop music,
North Korea has more soldiers relative to its population than any other country,
Cuba leads in doctors per capita and
Afghanistan is the world capital of opium production.

Other world records we are storing for that pub quiz to end all pub quizzes.
Fastest wifi: Lithuania.
Most Facebook addicts: Canada.
Most Scrabble players: Nigeria.
Most languages: Zimbabwe.

Scoring a distinction in the black category is a reverse compliment.
Which country wants to be first in murders? None – but the accolade goes to Honduras nonetheless.
Similar blemishes on national records are noted for Namibia (most car crashes),
Eritrea (most child labour),
China (most jailed journalists) and
Mongolia (most velociraptors – although that can’t be a current problem. Can it?)

Talking of which, these stats may be fairly random, but there does appear to be something good going on in East Africa re gender equality: most female entrepreneurs, but also most female workers and most women in parliament.

PapaBrowne:
Wait, so if you are driving a boat through the creeks of the Niger Delta, whether you are carrying fish or cement, as long as the guy in the helicopter feels you are bunkering crude, he has been given the right to pull his trigger without any proper assessment.

The Nigerian Air Force (NAF) has destroyed another set of illegal oil barges in Rivers States. Two of the latest barges filled with stolen oil were set ablaze by NAF helicopters on armed patrol around Okoromabie and South East of Port Harcourt refinery.

The third barge, surrounded by canoes carrying drums, was sited at Onne. While individuals around the barge and canoes fled when fired at, the barge and drums did not explode, indicating the possibility of being empty.

AlwaysUltraPad:
you ibo?

Justiceleague1:
for una afonjanic mind,anybody thats gat a dissenting view of ur warped beliefs is igbo... Quit ua arabic abi latin,i am a benin boy,edo state. Ndo.

Edo ke? With all your posts defending Biafra littering NL.
You just joined NL abi, you don't know the tricks yet. Nwata kiri.

Justiceleague1:
afonja mallam

no to fulani herdsmen.

APCsupporter:
Rraping? Those who rape toddlers are mostly pastors. In fact check NL fp. I'm sure you would find one that happened just today or yesterday.

Millerz:
Mohammed aka your mentor comes to mind coupled with every other Muslim man.