Stop Building Houses On Drainages, Lagos Warns Residents

Lagos State Government has issued a fresh warning to residents to avoid building houses on wetlands, drainage channels and pipelines so that their property will not be demolished.

A statement on Sunday quoted the Commissioner for Environment, Mr Tunji Bello, as saying this during a visit to Mosan-Okunola Local Council Development Area.

He said the houses built on petroleum pipelines and under high tension electricity cables lines were illegal.

Bello explained that when such houses were demolished, there would be no compensation for the owners. He added that short notice would be given to them since they had no approval from the government.

He said, "What is happening now is that people are building indiscriminately. If government wants to build a drainage channel, how does government build drainage channel in that kind of situation?

"This is one of the things we have to tell our people so that they can realise and stop such action. In the process of trying to build our canals, many of the buildings located on the drains will have to go. There is no compensation for disobeying the law. People are not expected to build on wet lands."

Chairman, Mosan-Okunola LCDA, Abiodun Mafe, urged residents who own buildings on the pipelines and wetlands to yield to sensitisations by the government.

 "If you don't take to government's warnings, you deserve no compensation, instead, you need to be sanctioned. You don't say because you want to be a landlord, you build where you are not supposed to build."