The Nigerian Air Force (NAF) says it has inaugurated a post-service mortgage scheme for young recruits and commissioned officers.

The Director of Public Relations and Information, NAF Headquarters, Air Commodore Olatokunbo Adesanya, disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday in Abuja.

According to him, it is part of the NAF’s determination in enhancing the welfare needs of its personnel.

Adesanya said that NAF was in collaboration with the Federal Housing Authority Mortgage Bank Limited (FHAMB) to achieve this objective.

“The scheme, which also accommodates airmen/airwomen and officers with between 10 and 20 years to spend in the service, is aimed at assisting personnel to have houses after retirement.

“The newly-enlisted airmen/airwomen and commissioned officers as well as those with up to 10 to 20 years in service are expected to open accounts with FHAMB and make monthly deposits.

“With this scheme, the difficulties usually encountered by NAF personnel in raising funds from commercial banks, coupled with the relatively high interest rates, would be eliminated,” he said.

The director said one of the advantages of the scheme was that prospective mortgage contributors were at liberty to choose where they wanted their houses located.

He said after this, NAF Housing and Construction Company Ltd. would access their contributions and build the houses for the officers.

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Adesanya explained that the houses would be financed by the FHAMB while subscribers were expected to pay for the mortgage for the period of their service or within 10 to 20 years as the case may be.

“If a contributors’ funds are insufficient to build the house of their choice, NAF Housing/Construction Company would  access their contributions with the Federal Housing Loan Scheme to make up for the shortage.

“This initiative will no doubt reduce the pressure and stress hitherto being experienced by NAF personnel in meeting the timelines for payments on post-service housing schemes,’’ Adesanya said.

According to him, the Managing Director of NAF Housing and Construction Ltd., AVM Shehu Adamu, has distributed registration forms to the newly-enlisted airmen/airwomen who recently completed the Basic Military Training Course.

The director said further that So far, about 1,224 recruits had registered for the scheme.

Adesanya reports that in 2016, the Chief of the Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar, initiated a post-service housing project, known as the NAF Eagle Estate Project, for non-commissioned officers (NCOs).

This, he said, was to address the gap in previous similar schemes, which excluded personnel in the SNCOs’ cadre, located in Bwari Area Council.

He said that the estate was planned to accommodate 905 units of 3-bedroom terrace duplex, 3-bedroom semi-detached bungalow and 3-bedroom detached bungalows.

Adesanya explained that the plan was to extend the project to other cities such as Enugu, Kaduna and Lagos. (NAN)