FOLLOWING the marking of houses and subsequent demolition executed by the new Kano State Government, headed by Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, and the controversies the policy has generated, The ICIR deployed its reporters, Marcus Fatunmole FATUNMOLE and Olayinka FATUNBI, to the state on June 28 for a thorough investigation into the crisis. Here is their account after meeting relevant stakeholders in the state.
Key issues in reportThe Kano State Government justifies the demolition of buildings with the claim that it is recovering public lands illegally sold by its predecessor.
- The argument is flawed with unexplained exemptions of some of the buildings by the government. Victims said the spared properties belong to the government’s relations or loyalists.
- Apart from the exemptions, the current chairman of the state Public Complaints and Anti-Corruption Commission, Muhyi Magaji, was part of the last administration and a beneficiary of the land sold by the former government led by Abdullahi Ganduje. The ICIR has a copy of documents of the land he bought and sold to a resident who is now a victim of the demolition.
- This ICIR reports that some affected property owners said they purchased their lands before Ganduje’s tenure.According to estimates from a surveying firm in the state, assets being lost to the demolitions run in into several billions of naira, in a state with an estimated $12 billion economy and 90 per cent of all residents falling below the poverty line.
- Most officials who served in the last administration refused to speak on the crisis; sources said the officials had fled the state.
- The new government says no regret for its action, blames buyers and Ganduje administration for the demolition.
- Compensation is likely only for a few victims.
- Residents, including APC legal adviser, victims say demolition is a political vendetta.
- We warned Ganduje – ASUP, other education stakeholders.
A drive around many parts of Kano city brings three things into sight: the debris from several properties that the government pulled down within days after it assumed office; the buildings whose roofs, doors and windows have been dismantled, and the heaps of garbage littering many parts of the northern Nigerian business hub, especially the Sabongari area. This report focuses on the first two.
At noon on Friday, June 30, a day after the just-concluded Eid-el-Kabir festivity, Saminu Shehu Muhammad arrived at the gate of his multimillion-naira home marked by the state government for demolition.
He alighted from his car, nodded repeatedly and stared at the house. He moved towards the building’s electric fence and scanned through the copies of a court judgement posted on its perimeter walls. He then inched a few meters away from his large gate, gazing at scavengers breaking into the rubbles of block works and ruins of concrete floors of his neighbour’s properties from a distance.
The location behind the School of Management Studies in the Salanta area, said to be owned by the Kano State Polytechnic.
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The new government had pulled down dozens of posh houses like Muhammad’s and malls on the premises because they were allegedly built on the school land.
Muhammad’s house is the most exquisite among the few remaining.
But for a Federal High Court exparte order, his property would have turned to rubble.
He claimed the state-owned courts denied him the order before he headed to the Federal High Court.
His fate now depends on the government’s willingness to obey the order, pending when the court will determine the motion on notice.
Peeking through his house, Muhammad told The ICIR he followed all legal processes before acquiring the land, adding that all victims of the exercise in the area had their documents issued by the past government.
“The new government didn’t give us any notice; they just came to our houses and asked us to quit. We urged them to investigate the matter before the demolition started.
“The new governor alleged that seventy per cent of the houses in Salanta belonged to Ganduje and his wife. God knows that Ganduje doesn’t know me, and nobody in his cabinet or his family knows me. I am just a businessman. I do my business at Kwari market.”
Another victim, Ayuba Sani, owns a storey building under construction in the area. He said he had spent over one hundred million naira on the property.
He bought the land two years ago. “It was not the government that sold the land to me. I bought it from someone who received the allocation from the past administration.”
He said the government notified him of the demolition on June 14.
He went to complain at the Kano State Urban Planning and Development Authority (KANUPDA), the agency executing the demolition.
“On June 16 at night, two days after we went to the KANUPDA office, we saw bulldozers approaching our structures. Without delay, they started demolishing our houses,” he said.
Sani Mustapha Kurmawa is another victim of the exercise. He was almost in tears while narrating his ordeals to The ICIR. The 50-year-old claimed he would lose over N300 million if the government pulled down his properties.
He took our reporters to one of his properties, a big event centre along the BUK Road, split in two by a thick wall. He has dismantled the centre, leaving only the walls waiting to be torn down by bulldozers.
Describing the government action as a ‘mistake’, Kurmawa said the area where he had his properties had been a stream.
“After I bought it, I filled the stream with sand and debris so the people in the area would be safe. After filling the stream, I donated part of the land to a nearby school to build classes and used the remaining space.
“Despite my kindness, the KNUPDA marked my place for demolition, and it didn’t mark the portion I donated to the school.”
He said the government targeted him because he was a member of the opposition party – the All Progressives Congress (APC).
“From Kofar Famfo down to Kabuga, many buildings were allocated during former Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso’s administration, and they did not mark them. But they marked our own just because the immediate past administration allocated it, which shows it’s politically motivated” he explains.
The Kano ancient wall, known locally as ‘Badala’, is erected along the Kofar Famfo – BUK Road.
Many residents interviewed by The ICIR said the government was partial in marking homes in the area.
Kurmawa, Sani and Muhammad are among the scores of demolition victims.
While the new government argued that its predecessor sold the land to cronies, families, and APC loyalists, thereby altering the city’s master plan, the former government and victims described the action as a political vendetta.
Background to the crisis
There are three major players in the crisis: the state’s former Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, who founded the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), which produced the incumbent government; Governor Yusuf; and the former Governor Ganduje.
Kwankwanso had protested public land sales before his party won the last governorship election and had vowed to pull down every structure erected on the lands sold if his party won the election.
He said the lands sold were on religious places, cemeteries, schools, hospitals and other sites. Kwankwaso’s opposition to land sales by Ganduje further incensed the hostility between the two leaders.
The ICIR reports that Ganduje was Kwankwanso’s former deputy. Both leaders enjoyed a smooth relationship till the former succeeded the latter on May 29, 2015.
But as of June, the enmity had grown so profoundly that Ganduje threatened to slap his former principal at the State House in Abuja because he (Kwankwaso) backed the demolition.
Massive buildings turned into rubbles
Several buildings, including residences, hotels, shops, malls, and monuments, have been levelled by Governor Yusuf since June 3, when the exercise began. The governor took over power from Ganduje, whose party lost at the governorship election on May 29.
Some of the buildings brought down are the three-star Daula Hotel consisting of at least 50 rooms, four executive rooms, a restaurant and other facilities; and a three-storey building at the Race Course in the Nasarawa GRA, which had 90 shops.
The Eid Prayer Ground witnessed the most extensive demolition. Many residents interviewed said there were scores of storey buildings on the land.
“We had several-storey buildings here before they came and destroyed everything. We had more than 50 of them,” said Abdullahi Musa, a resident of the area.
“All the houses were like these two and three storey-buildings surrounding the area, but they are all gone,” he added, pointing at nearby cluttered buildings.
The ICIR could not count the houses at the Hajj Camp, another location where several buildings were flattened, but some reports said there were 130 houses on the land. They were mainly shops and malls. When our crew got to the premises on June 29, only rubbles were left of all invested on the land.
The government did not spare dozens of shops built in front of the Government Girls Secondary School, Dukuwuya, along Federal College of Education in the city.
Similarly, hundreds of shops within a swathe of storey buildings await demolition along France Road within the Sabongari area.
Doors and windows have been removed from most of the structures.
The ICIR gathered that some buildings at the location were built before Ganduje took over power in 2015.
There are similar scores of buildings along the BUK Road, including fuel stations and large plazas.
These were in addition to the Government House Roundabout monument flattened by the government because its “location was wrong”, and it was “a huge structure that blocked not only the scenery but the vision of the persons coming from all sides”, according to the new Commissioner for Information, Baba Halilu Dantiye.
The ICIR reports that while the government said 95 per cent of people in the city were happy with the demolition, most residents interviewed condemned the action and accused the government of launching a vendetta against its predecessor.
Residents averred that it was wrong for Ganduje to sell public land, especially prayer grounds, schools, hospitals and city wall corridors. They also accused the government of exempting buildings of its loyalists among those marked along the BUK Road and other locations.
Besides, they argued that some of the land beneficiaries, who were APC members, had decamped to the NNPP and were shielded. The head of the anti-corruption agency, Muhyi Magaji, is prominent among those allegedly covered.
The crew obtained the land documents bought and sold by Magaji. One of the reporters contacted him through the phone. He didn’t pick up several calls put to his line. He did not also respond to text message sent to him.
Estimated cost of some of the buildings
The ICIR contacted a surveyor at the Murijawando and Co Estate Surveyors and Valuers in the state.
The surveyor provided this organisation with the values of three buildings within two locations where the government demolished properties.
One of the buildings is a six-bedroom duplex at the Hajj Camp.
The land measuring 450 square meters cost N18,000,000, and the cost of the building work was N59,317,335 million. The building’s total cost was N77,317,335.
The second building, a 13-bedroom duplex along Salanta Quarter, was behind the School of Management Studies. The cost of the land, measuring 1,800 square metres, was N144,000,000. The building cost was N401,819,680, and the total money spent on the structure was N545,819,680.
The third property, a nine-bedroom duplex along Salanta Quarter behind the School of Management Studies, was bought for N85,680,000. It measured 1,071 metres square. The building cost was N218,158,610, and the total cost was N303,838,610.
Because the demolished and marked buildings are in the hundreds, the properties’ worth is in billions of naira, given the values by the surveyor on three buildings.
This estimate (billions of naira) is much less than the government’s value for the Eid Ground alone.
More victims speak against demolition
Alike Onyekachi, Nelson Chime, Anthony Chinedu and Chigozie Emmanuel are among the occupants of shops within several storey buildings on France Road, near the Kano Pillars Stadium. They pay between N300,000 and N400,000 annually as rent. Some had just paid the rent before the government marked their shops. They have emptied their shops, hoping the government bulldozers would emerge anytime to bring down the buildings. They have occupied the buildings for at least three years.
Like most buildings on affected lands in the city, many structures on France Road already have their roofs, windows, and doors pulled out, with some allegedly removed and carted away by criminals, as reported in other locations.
The Police in the state arrested and arraigned over 100 of the suspected thieves in court, while at least two scavengers died from structures partly destroyed.
At the Eid Ground are scores of victims who have invested so much in properties destroyed by the government on the premises. They said they had spent about 20 million each on their buildings.
They are mainly small-scale business people who thought they would no longer pay rent on shops for the rest of their lives. But their investments are all gone.
The traders still hang around nearby shops, and some continue to use the shops they rented adjacent to the Prayer Ground.
The ICIR spoke with the market deputy leader, Masaud Ibrahim, Ibrahim Danfulani, Mustapha Yusuf, Abbas Yawu, Rakiya Mai Kanwake, Hafsat Umar, Sahura Garba, Sharib Musa, Yahaya Sani, and Anwalu Ali. They all condemned the exercise.
Some traders happy with demolition
Rakiya Mai Danwake, Mustapha Yusuf, Jafar Sarki Dabo and Hafsat Umar are happy with the exercise. They were among the traders in the city but did not have a shop or any building among those demolished.
They said the former administration and developers of plots sold at the Prayer Ground and Hajj Camp chased them away from where they had traded in the open for several years.
According to them, the new government did the right thing to have pulled down the buildings on the lands.
“The past administration was always chasing and harassing us. Sometimes, they even seize our wares. I swear to God; I am happy with what the new government did. I support the demolition. It does not affect my business,” said Umar.
Former government officials allegedly go into hiding
The ICIR contacted the Secretary of the former government, Usman Alhaji Usman. Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Lawan Musa Abdullahi, Commissioner for Information, Muhammad Garba, and the Permanent Secretary of the State Bureau for Land Management, Zainab Ibrahim-Braji. None of them agreed to speak with our crew about the demolition exercise.
The ICIR called several times and sent the officials text and Whatsapp messages. They did not pick up the calls or respond to the messages.
Sources in the state said many officials who served in the past administration had fled because of the issues surrounding the demolition and other ongoing investigations into the activities of the past government.
On July 3, the state anti-corruption agency arrested Ganduje’s Commissioner for Works, Idris Wada Saleh, over one billion naira fraud allegation. The agency went further to invite the former governor for questioning on July 5 over a video where he was seen pocketing wads of dollars, supposedly a bribe from a contractor.
Governor, Information Commissioner, MD KNUPDA insist land revocation policy stands
On Saturday, July 1, The ICIR crew was with Governor Yusuf at the Government House, where he hosted the Emir of Rano, Kabiru Muhammad Inuwa.
The governor reiterated his government’s decision to reclaim all public lands sold by Ganduje.
“In our campaign promises, we assured our commitment to restoring the glory of Kano state through reclaiming all encroached public lands where private individuals or groups erected illegal structures.”
“These places are meant for public utilisation. It is therefore disheartening to witness the incessant destruction and conversion of public places that are used to render social services by unpatriotic citizens. We shall bring an end to land grabbing and indiscriminate erection of illegal structures in the state,” he told the Emir.
A day before, he had told the Emir of Kano, Aminu Ado Bayero, that he had no regret destroying the properties.
The Commissioner for Information, Baba Halilu Dantiye, aligned with the governor.
In an exclusive interview with The ICIR, he denied allegations of political vendetta by Governor Yusuf’s government. He claimed that ninety-five per cent of Kano people were happy with the demolitions.
However, he said the government was law-abiding and would study the orders already issued against the exercise by the court.
“Now that the Attorney-General is in place, he has been sworn in. I’m sure he will make suggestions and advise accordingly. “This is a government that obeys rules. The former government didn’t obey the rules. They didn’t obey court orders. I assure you that this government will obey court orders. We will take action according to the rule of law,” he stated.
He said the government was setting up a commission of enquiry where victims would table their complaints and possibly get compensation.
Besides, he noted that the demolition had no consequence on investment in the state.
The ICIR reports that many victims interviewed argued that the exercise would negatively affect investment in the state.
Among them is Kurmawa (mentioned earlier), who said banks no longer accept land documents because of the fear succeeding government could revoke such land.
A lawyer in the state, Abubakar Laro Yusuf, also shared the same view as Kurmawa.
Speaking exclusively with The ICIR in his office, the Managing Director of the Kano Urban Planning and Development Authority (KNUPDA), Ibrahim Yakubu Adamu, disagreed with the argument that the government carried out the demolition too hastily. He said the government made its position clear months before its inauguration.
He dismissed claims that the exercise was a political vendetta against Ganduje’s government.
“People that are shouting are just about five per cent. Ninety-five per cent are happy about what the governor is doing. The five per cent, it is either they are the beneficiaries or the ones that have perpetrated the act. Very soon, you will hear that there is a judicial enquiry, and all the issues will be sorted out.”
“For example, the Institute for Tourism and Hospitality is a university. He (Ganduje) sold it out to his cronies or himself. This Daula Hotel was already a university under Kano State University. About 2,000 students were schooling there. They relocated them where they didn’t have the facility to accommodate them. What do you expect the government to do?”
He said the government had to reclaim the lands for the state’s growing population.
He also said the past administration sold many court lands and judges’ residences.
While promising that the government would respect court orders, he blamed Ganduje’s government and the land buyers for the crisis.
I warned Ganduje against selling public lands
Ibrahim Usman Aikawa, a doctorate holder and engineer, is the former Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic (ASUP) Chairman. He is currently the coordinator of the Coalition of Stakeholders on Education in the state. He works with the Kano State Polytechnic as a chief lecturer.
He said he joined others to warn Ganduje’s government against selling public lands through appeals and protests.
“We organised protests against selling our land. The government did not heed our advice. They went ahead and did what they did. People in the state should remember that we cautioned the government not to do this. They did; people came in and started buying.”
He said the blueprint of the new administration was to recover all public lands allocated to people.
“It took them about three years campaigning that whosoever buys this land do it at his own risk. For example, I can’t see anywhere in Nigeria that somebody will go into a praying ground and sell the land to the public. Look at how important religion is,” he said.
Aikawa alleged that some officials of the past government invested the money they siphoned in the buildings.
“There is nowhere they want to hide their money. They will now sink the money in this business (of building houses). Go to the buildings, check all the areas, and you will find out that you only see some offices being occupied by tenants.”
He defended the head of the anti-corruption agency, saying it was the court that reinstated him and not the new government.
Ganduje had sacked Muhyi Magaji before a court reinstated him on May 31.
Speaking on the implications of the demolitions on the state economy, the lecturer said no serious investor would invest in Eid Ground, hospital or school lands.
APC Lawyer react
Barrister Abdul Adamu is the APC lawyer in the state. He’s the only person in Ganduje’s camp willing to speak with this organisation on the crisis.
He said the demolition was political vendetta and condemnable. “Condemnable in the sense that there is no way a rational being or a rational government can just come and start demolishing structures because it was the first administration that allocated the land. They said most of the lands were sold, and up till today, there is nowhere they justified the allegation that the government sold.”
“Most people whose buildings were pulled down came up with their certificate, showing that it was allocated to certain individuals. Then, those particular individuals sold the property to them after the government had allocated it.”
He said sections one and five of the Land Use Act empower the governor to allocate land to people.
He frowned at the government labelling the structures as illegal. “The nagging question is, who pronounced those structures illegal?” he queried.
“The governor cannot on his own just wake up and say these structures are illegal,” he added.
He said the Eid Ground is so big that 80 per cent of it had no people when Muslim faithful came to pray there during the last Eid-el-Kabir celebration.
“During the reign of Governor Musa Kwankwaso, he allocated lands on the ancient Kano Wall (Badala) to certain cronies and individuals. The lands that he allocated to his people are still there without being demolished. That is why some people see it as vendetta. Why is it that the lands allocated by former Governor Kwankwaso during his tenure were not marked for demolition? Why is it that only the ones allocated by Governor Ganduje were marked for demolition?.”
Lawyer reacts to crisis
Yusuf, a legal practitioner based in the state (mentioned earlier), said he wasn’t concerned about whether the demolitions were borne out of political vendetta but said the implications were that the policy would affect the public investment in properties, particularly properties owned by the government.
“If one government could allocate lands to people, give them consent to assign the property. And then, after that government has gone, another government comes and says, ‘Look, all those things, we do not agree with them’ and will move into the property and start demolishing, nobody, in my view, no good investor will invest his money in property owned by the government. So, it will affect the value of property allocated by the government.”
He said the exercise could cause a security threat to the state.
He urged the victims not to take laws into their hands but to pursue legal remedies.
The lawyer said it was surprising that some of the state’s courts declined to grant exparte applications for interim injunctions to restrain demolition of properties pending the determination of the motion on notice to enable all parties to be heard before the court would grant interlocutory injunctions.
He said “However, one cannot rightly say or conclude that the government has pocketed courts. But the fact remains that in cases where there is urgency, one will expect the High Court to act promptly and forestall damages that may occur to those properties if they are demolished, and at the end of the day, the owners of those properties are found to be entitled to the properties and the act of demolition was not lawful. That is the situation we found ourselves in that High Court did not act promptly to grant those exparte orders.”
Litigation may delay resumption of demolition
The ICIR reports that since the Eid-el-Kabir holiday, the demolition has stopped.
A prominent lawyer in the state, who pleaded anonymity, said there were almost 300 litigations arising from the exercise before various courts in the state.
Marcus bears the light, and he beams it everywhere. He's a good governance and decent society advocate. He's The ICIR Reporter of the Year 2022 and has been the organisation's News Editor since September 2022. Contact him via email @ [email protected].