By Stanley Onyekwere
In order to hit the ground running in the development of the nine districts under the Abuja Land Swap Initiative, the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) said it would soon complete the final engineering design of all the districts.
The FCT Minister, Senator Bala Mohammed, made this disclosure after meeting with some senior officials of the FCDA Engineering Services Department and Abuja Infrastructure Investment Centre (AIIC) in his office, at the weekend, in Abuja.
“The final engineering design of nine Districts under the Land Swap Scheme would soon be put to rest, with nine of the developers having completed their design, checked and approved.
“With these districts coming on board Abuja property would be made more affordable to the residents of the Federal Capital Territory in line with the vision of the Transformation Agenda of President Goodluck Jonathan,” a statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the FCT Minister, Muhammad Sule, quoted the minister.
In the statement, Mohammed reiterated that the opening up of these new districts would not only make land more accessible but would also drastically reduce the skyrocketed house rents being charged by shylock Abuja land lords.
Also, the Minister assured that his Administration would not rest on its oars until the knotty issue of housing deficit prevalent in some major cities is adequately redressed.
He revealed that the construction cost and total project cost of these districts are being finalized with negotiation completed with five developers.
The minister further revealed that agreement has been signed with four of the developers, preparatory to the groundbreaking ceremony.
Meanwhile, the Minister said that the rehabilitation and expansion of Umaru Musa Yar’Adua Expressway (Airport Road) Lots I & II are 90% and 99.8% completed respectively.
According to him, the rehabilitation and expansion of Murtala Mohammed Expressway (Kubwa Road) Lots I & II are also 96.5 and 94.5 completed respectively.
Senator Mohammed stated that the FCT Administration has achieved 68% in the on-going development of Idu Industrial Area 1B engineering Infrastructure; while Karmo Residential District Infrastructure is now 92%.
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