As part of efforts to resolve the long-standing dispute between the Federal Government and the Lagos State Government on federal assets in the state, a Special Committee on Federal Government Assets in Lagos State set up to determine the statuses and titles of the disused lands and buildings has submitted its report. The Committee, headed by Alhaji Femi Okunnu, former Federal Commissioner of Works, has eminent members such as Mr. Femi Falana, SAN, a SimmonsCooper partner, Mrs. Victoria Alonge and Permanent Secretary in the Lagos State Lands Bureau, Mr. Olabode Agoro.
It is commendable that the Lagos State Government is taking definite steps to resolve the long-standing dispute between it and the Federal Government on the statuses of the said assets. Listed as being in dispute are the lands housing the Federal Secretariat in Ikoyi; the International Trade Fair Complex; Banana Island; Osborne Foreshore; Festac Town; Satellite Town and, indeed, the whole of Ikoyi with boundary at Lagos Canal standing between Ikoyi Island and Lagos Island.
The situation in which many government assets have been allowed to lie waste and fall into disuse is not acceptable, more so, at this period of serious national economic adversity. To the listed assets, we can easily add the National Theatre at Iganmu, the National Stadium in Surulere, the NET Building in Marina and even the new National Stadium in Abuja, which was built for N56 billion but is now a shadow of its old self.
Why does government, especially the central government in Abuja, have a penchant for wasting assets and scarce resources of the country? It is this concern that presently drives the Lagos State Government. As Governor Akinwunmi Ambode clearly stated at the report presentation ceremony, the concern of the state government is to see how quickly the dispute between it and the federal government can be resolved so that the assets can be put to valuable use to shore up the internally generated revenue of the state and rapidly boost the state’s economy.
Any neutral observer would readily admit that there is some merit in the Lagos claim. The assets, including the lands in dispute, are vast, diverse and in prime locations. It is a great disservice to the state in particular and the nation as a whole to leave them in their present state of abandonment and disuse. It is necessary to recall that one of the commitments the then Head of State, late General Murtala Muhammed, made when he received and accepted the late Justice Akinola Aguda Panel report which recommended a new Federal Capital Territory for the country was that Lagos would remain the commercial capital of Nigeria and continue as a special Centre of Development, along with Kaduna, Enugu and Port Harcourt.
But forty years down the line, what has happened to that commitment? Instead of maintaining and enhancing the status of Lagos as the apex commercial capital of the country, successive federal administrations have neglected the “Centre of Excellence.” The neglect that federal assets in the state have suffered over the intervening years is glaring.
This deliberate wastage of assets must not continue. This is the sad commentary that the Lagos State Government wants to change. The state deserves the understanding and support of the federal authorities. We are glad that the Lagos administration understands that the job of determining the ownership and jurisdiction of the identified assets is not completed yet, hence the need for the buy in of all patriotic citizens to ensure that the dispute is brought to an amicable and quick resolution.
When the matter is resolved, hopefully in favour of Lagos State, this could become a veritable template other states can use to reclaim their wasting assets from the Federal Government. The point has been well made that the central government has become too large and unwieldy to have good direction and control of its many assets acquired greedily and scattered all over the country.
This dispute over assets further lends weight to the need to restructure the federation and give vent to true federalism. There is only so much a central government, far removed from the diverse heartbeats of its constituent states, can do to weld them together.