Lagos-Ibadan Expressway: Illegal buildings’ll go, says Amosun

Ogun State Governor Ibikunle Amosun yesterday said illegally built structures on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway will be demolished.

At a Town Hall meeting with allottees of plots located at Hill Crest GRA in Abeokuta and on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Amosun lamented that even after his administration froze development on the axis, some people continued to erect structures.

He said: “Law and order has broken down there. I cannot be part of it. I will not take any land under the guise of overridden public interest only to transfer it to self, Mr. A or Mr. B.

“Everyday you pass through that road, you see people developing the land, even after you have advised them to stop work. The unfortunate aspect of it is that many of these developers have not perfected their approval documents. Yet, they don’t bother to come to the government to perfect their papers.

“That is unacceptable. We won’t allow lawlessness. But since they flouted the order, then, when we start checking the records, we will not hesitate to demolish whatever they may have put on the land. Any structure that is illegal there will have to go.”

Amosun said a government White Paper on land allocation and management would be published soon.

He said the White Paper would spell out land allocation plans of the government and it would be gazetted.

Amosun said the area the immediate-past government earmarked as Hill Crest GRA is inaccessible, adding that non-existing plots were allocated to thr unsuspecting public.

He said: “What we found on ground is a haphazard arrangement where anything goes, and you can get anything so far you know someone up there. There was no definite pattern or plan.

“But we will establish a standard practice, where people will go to the Bureau of Lands and get things done without knowing anyone. The template will be system-driven.”

Also yesterday, Oyo State Governor Abiola Ajimobi urged the concessionaire of the road, Messrs Bi-Courtney, to repair collapsed portions.

Ajimobi spoke in his office at Ibadan, the state capital, while receiving the company’s Chairman, Dr. Wale Babalakin.

He said his administration would partner Bi-Courtney on infrastructural development under the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement.

Ajimobi said: “We are exploring partnering your company in infrastructural development, under a PPP arrangement.”

Babalakin assured the governor that work will begin on the road soon.

Culled from: The Nation written by  Ernest Nwokolo, Abeokuta and Oseheye Okwuofu, Ibadan.