Summit hinges affordable housing delivery on stable power supply

Affordable housing delivery was a major discourse at the just concluded Lagos State Economic Summit, otherwise known as ‘Ehingbeti’, and in the opinion of discussants at the summit, affordable housing can only be achieved in Nigeria when power supply becomes stable.

This year’s summit, which was the 7th edition of the annual event, focused on the theme ‘Harnessing Electricity to Grow Agriculture, Transportation and Housing Sector’, with greater emphasis on power.

Housing sector experts who spoke at one of the break-out sessions noted that unstable power supply in the country has slowed the real estate sector’s growth through the inability of indigenous industries to produce cheap local building materials, thus compelling developers to opt for ‘cheaper’ imported materials.

According to them, expectation that the privatisation of the successor companies carved out of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) would lead to the growth of this sector through steady supply of power to local industries and, consequently, lower prices of locally-produced building materials has so far turned a pipedream.

They added that the official handover of the firms to private investors in October 2013 was expected to propel growth of the nation’s economy on all fronts, including the housing sector, pointing out that six months down the line, the housing sector was yet to show signs of growth.

“With an efficient power supply, it’s easier to deliver affordable housing,” Hassan Usman, managing director, ASO Savings and Loans plc, said, explaining that if power supply was stable, industries which specialised in producing building materials such as tiles, sanitary wares, etc would be producing at cheaper rates, thereby giving property developers the opportunity to deliver houses that would be affordable to mid- and even low-income earners.

However, this is currently not the case as most developers have continued to patronise the seemingly cheaper imported building materials despite the high exchange rate of the naira to foreign currencies.

Olumide Olusanya, a professor of Architecture at the University of Lagos (UNILAG), contended that as a densely-populated state with a significant housing deficit estimated to be almost two million, it has become imperative for Lagos to explore faster building techniques such as prefabricated building systems. He pointed out, however, that lack of steady power supply to steel industries have thrown spanner in the wheel of such initiatives.

Among other limitations in the housing sector posed by the wobbling power sector is the inability of some state governments to deliver very high-rise buildings in densely-populated areas.

Bosun Jeje, Lagos State commissioner for housing, in his submission, hinged the inability of the state to build mini-apartments on very high-rise buildings to epileptic power supply, saying, “Currently, our high-rise buildings are limited to four floors and not the usual 10 floors or more we see in other parts of the world.”

He explained further that the state lacks adequate power supply, while high-rise buildings demand constant power supply to power some amenities such as escalators for their occupants.

ODINAKA MBONU