Ogun seeks partnership with Wemabod Estatesto build affordable housing

Ogun State government is seeking partnership with Wemabod Estates Limited and other real estate investors to provide affordable housing for the people and reduce the state’s housing deficit.

The state explains that this partnership has become necessary considering that many homes and property have been demolished to give way to roads construction and rehabilitation in the state.

Wemabod had earlier sought for land from the state government to build 500 housing units in Abeokuta and 5,000 shops tagged ‘Neighbourhood Market’ across the state.

Having observed increasing demands for housing facilities in the state, the state governor, Ibikunle Amosu requested Wemabod to also increase its planned housing provision in the state, noting that the provision of affordable housing programme for the people required the collaboration of all relevant stakeholders, pledging that government would continue to partner genuine investors in the building industry so that its dream of providing houses that would be within the reach of its citizens could be realised.

“After Lagos, we are the next port of call. We have the land and the people. We have the human capital to support you more than any other states in the South West. I will like to see more of Odua presence and Wemabod in Ogun State,” the governor told the company.

He commended the management of the company for sustaining the legacies of its forebears, tasking it to look inward and come up with projects that would also stand the test of time, just as the like of late Obafemi Awolowo and other Yoruba leaders did when building the South West.

Meanwhile, the massive roads construction and rehabilitation project going on in all the state’s senatorial districts has increased land prices by 50 percent as well as house rent by 20-35 percent, boosting property business in the state.

A survey carried out by BusinessDay across the state indicates that hitherto abandoned hectares of land on the outskirts of major cities in the state, namely Abeokuta, Ijebu-Ode, Sagamu and Sango-Ota have now been taken over by various owners and estate developers erecting different residential and industrial structures on them.

In Abeokuta, places like Bode-Olude, Eleweran, Obada Oko, Rounda-Ayetoro road, Mawuko, Gbonagun, Isolu-FUNAAB-Alaba road, Kobape road have received, in recent times, a large movement of people, building one property or other on the hitherto considered virgin land, while a plot of land that used to be sold at N150,000 per plot now sold for N300,000 and N400,000, just as rent also increased by 20-35 percent.

In Sango-Ota, places like Agbara, Igbesa, Agbado crossing, a plot of land which was initially sold for N500,000 now sells for between N1 million and N2 million, while rent is even costlier in the area, just Ikangba, Epe road, Ibadan road in Ijebu-Ode and Ogijo, Ikorodu road in Sagamu as well as Ibafo, Mowe, Arepo, Werewa in Obafemi-Owode, among others, are much costlier now.