Haven Homes wants urgent action on cement price, scarcity

As a major stakeholder in Nigeria’s housing industry, Haven Homes says the volatile situation in Nigeria’s cement market is of utmost concern to it, hence its call on the Federal Government for  an urgent action on the soaring price and scarcity of the product.

As a lifestyle housing developer and promoter whose major ingredient of operation is cement, the company laments that in just for months, the price of cement has gone up by almost 30 percent, explaining that in December 2013, a bag of cement sold for N1,650 but now it is selling for N2,200 per bag, adding that, even at that price, it is difficult to find the commodity readily to buy.

Tayo Sonuga, the MD/CEO of the company who gave this hint in a statement made available to BusinessDay, declared that “this is clearly not acceptable; so I would want the government to do something urgent about it”.

 “I really think the government should do something drastic and urgent about the cement market”, he said, arguing that  if any positive steps are to be taken towards meeting the housing needs of Nigerians estimated at about 17 million units, availability and affordability of a commodity as important as cement cannot be over-emphasized.

“If the government at the federal and state levels are truly sincere and determined in their resolve to address the housing problems of Nigerians, they can show it by making cement not only cheap and affordable but also easily available”, he advised.

“An enabling environment should be created for manufacturers of cement to source easily the ingredients they need to produce cement. They should be encouraged so that they will, in turn, produce cheaper and more affordable cement product”, he advised further.

 Sonuga also wanted the government to look into what seemed to him as “a monopoly” established in the cement market in the country, noting that, at the moment, only Dangote Cement and Lafarge Cement are consistently producing cement in the entire country.

“For a country of 160 million people, that is not good enough; that sort of monopoly would make the product to be too expensive. Cement is too important to be left to the vagaries of private or public monopoly. You cannot build without cement, so the government cannot remain silent about this matter. It calls for urgent action”, he emphasized.

 Attempts to reach officials of the Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria (REDAN) for comments were futile, just as efforts at getting the views of the cement manufacturers failed.