The Lagos State Government has commenced the restoration of Government Residential Schemes to their original plans, in a bid to halt the indiscriminate conversion of buildings from residential to commercial.
The week-long monitoring and enforcement exercise is to be carried out in the Lekki Peninsula Scheme I and Magodo Residential Schemes I and II.
This disclosure was made by the Lagos State Commissioner for Physical Planning and Urban Development, Dr Idris Salako, on Tuesday, March 2, 2021, in Alausa.
Salako stated that Government Schemes ought to remain residential with provision for services as planned but the schemes had been bastardised by indiscriminate conversion of buildings from residential to commercial by some of the residents.
He added that if the pervasive lawlessness in these Estates were allowed to persist, the future would spell doom for the carefully designed upper-income residential schemes, noting that well-meaning residents had inundated the State Government with complaints and sought redress of the untoward situation.
Salako recalled that the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development had extensively engaged and dialogued with residents of the Estates with a view to righting the wrongs.
He said, “It is noteworthy that engagements with Magodo Phases I and II Residents Association produced the Revised Magodo Scheme I and II, which has since become effective.”
The Commissioner warned that indiscriminate conversion of Government Schemes from Residential to Commercial would not be tolerated in Lagos State and urged those liable for any unlawful conversion to brace up for the Ministry’s enforcement activities.
He said, “Our Monitoring and Enforcement team will be visiting all other Government Schemes for similar action in due course. I, hereby, urge that every part of the State should take a cue from the planned enforcement by desisting from the undue conversion of property without the approval of the appropriate authorities.”
The Lagos State Government had in the past clamped down on property owners who illegally convert their residential buildings to commercial purposes especially in locations like Ikeja, Victoria Island and so on.
While warning building owners against the unauthorized conversion of properties for commercial purposes, the state government pointed out that under the state’s physical planning law, a residential property owner must obtain a due permit before it can convert such building for commercial purposes.
This practice has seen hitherto purely residential areas turn into commercial with the presence of businesses.
