The Federal Government has hailed Delta state Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan’s housing policy for civil servants.
The Phase One of the project, comprising 150 houses, was last year approved to be built with over N614.9 million.
But the project failed to commence because mobilization fees were delayed for bureaucratic reasons until two months ago.
Governor Uduaghan’s Commissioner for Housing, Chief Paulinus Akpeki, who conducted a delegation from the Federal Ministry of Housing, Abuja, led by the Assistant Director (Architectoral Science), Akinola Saura, round the project site on Thursday, said the houses have been highly subsidized for low-cadre civil servants in the state to benefit.
He said, “as at the time we conceptualized the project, many in the government of His Excellency, Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan, had thought it was going to be one of those failed projects. Initially, we placed it on Owner-Occupier Basis (OOB) but now that we have gotten it right to this level, we have worked on a system that will make it Owner-Occupier Montgage (OOM).”
According to him, the state government would not make above N200,000 on each units after their commissioning.
Akinola, who expressed confidence that in the next one month, the units, comprising one-bedroom, two-bedroom and three-bedroom flats respectively, all of which were at their roofing stages, implored the state to reserve a dedicated account for housing construction on yearly basis.
“I implore the state to make it a seed-money on yearly basis for its Ministry of Housing to build 200 low-cost houses to cushion the effects of homelessness among civil servants”, Akinola said.