LAGOS GOVERNMENT PLACED EMBARGO ON LAND GRABBERS
Land owners for years have had their rights infringed upon; they have been terrorized and molested by land grabbers popularly called Omo-Onile.
These Omo-Onile claims and collect outrageous and unnecessary fees for unexplained reasons and those that challenge them end up been harassed by this Omo-Oniles. From my experience in my years of practice, the issue of land grabbers or Omo-Onile is one of the major fears on the minds of land buyers.
This same reasons have made some areas not as developed as it should be because of the fear of being harassed by these Omo-Oniles.
This issue no doubt has been a matter of discussion and debate for years. In the past, the Lagos state government had set up various task forces to address these issues with no fruitful outcome. But today, am happy to announce to you that the Lagos State Governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, on Monday August 15th ratified the state properties protection law, which endorsed a prison term of 21 years for suspects guilty of land grabbing .
Additionally, he signed the state neighborhood safety corps law which, as indicated by him, would help security of lives and properties in every one of the 20 Local Government Areas and 37 Local Council Development Areas. He signed the two laws at the State House, Alausa, within the sight of the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Hon. Mudashiru Obasa, Chief Judge of the State, Justice Funmilayo Atilade and the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Adeniji Kazeem among others. Before signing them, Governor Ambode said the laws were central to focus on safeguarding the lives of all residents, as well as attracting, growing investments and improving the ease of doing business in the State.
He added that notwithstanding preparing all the security offices in the state, the state government has now created a legal framework to put some form of communal protection in place to boost and support the great job the Nigeria Police is presently doing.
He said the safety corps would help the police and other security organizations to maintain law and order across the communities. The Neighborhood Safety Agency will be established to register all private home security and any other person employed for private home security, among other things.
This change will be something all Nigerian will embrace and I plead that the task force that has been assigned to bring these land grabbers to justice, effectively carry out their duties for the good of all ‘Lagocians’ and prospective land buyers in Lagos State.
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Nice moves thumb up lagos state govt
A laudable step towards property protection. However, our expectations would be met with the observation and experience of consequent coordination, implementation of processes and prosecution of defiant.
This is indeed a turning point in the state as it shows a responsive government in action. The law if properly applied will definitely serve as a deterrent to the Omo-oniles. Meanwhile we have to watch out for the neighbourhood watch now in place as they m.ay turn out to be legal omo-oniles in the long run. The moment the govt allows them to charge any form of fee for any service, or even empower them to collect any form of money, then the law is doomed. The empowerment should not go beyond reporting a disturbance to the police for action, and backing the real land owner. Anything beyond that, even the power to arrest an erring omo-onile will result in corrupting the whole process and legalising extortion which had been the stock-in-trade of the omo-oniles