Nigeria’s Minister of Housing says 17 million Nigerians do not have homes….

The Minister of Housing, Lands and Urban Development, Akon Eyakenyi, recently said that Nigeria is willing to partner with Iran in the provision of affordable houses in the country. The minister made the disclosure when she received an Iranian delegation led by its Minister of Industry, Mines and Trade, Mohammad Nematzadeh. Ms. Eyakenyi said Nigeria’s large population results in housing challenges. She said the 17 million Nigerians do not have houses. “We have realised that it is not possible that government alone can provide the housing needs of Nigerians,” she said.

Given the above about the housing gap which is known for more than 30 years, the question always is: what is the Nigeria government doing to address the housing gap? Whatever they are doing and or have done, it does not seem to be meeting the gap or closing it. 

Historically, Nigeria has never in any given year delivered 100,000 housing units from both the private and public sectors. But the question for me is, why partner with Iran? What has Iran got to offer Nigeria in housing delivery?

Iran is basically a country run at the same level or worse than Nigeria and has its own mounting issues. On currency exchange rate, One Iranian Rial is equal to $0.000039, meaning - a worthless currency. If that is the case, why should Nigeria with a far superior exchange rate of the Naira to US Dollar as far as the Iranian Rial is concerned, look to partner with such a country on a critical aspect of its socio-economic sector – Housing?

Nigeria should have a benchmark or threshold and that is, it will not partner or seek solutions from any country whose exchange rate is worse than its own: The Naira. That will drive away some of the vulture countries. If one does not affirm its high standard and hoist it proudly, they become a ‘free-for-all-country’ and Nigeria shamelessly has hoisted herself to the world as such. Nigeria’s desire to seek solutions and ‘manna’ from anyone no matter their situation has made the country a basket case.

Nigeria’s lack of standards and expectations makes the country’s leadership to look for solutions from all corners of the world except its own. For instance, Nigeria loves to do business with India. Indians are ‘kings’ in Nigeria. Nigeria forgets that there are more poor people in India than all of West Africa combined. Indians look and act like ‘moguls’ in Nigeria  partly because they have mastered how to get business out of Nigeria – bribery and cutting corners. There are over 900m Indians who are desperately and depressingly poor.

Statistically speaking, for one poor Nigerian, there are nearly 6 poor Indians. Indians get multi-million dollar contracts from Nigeria but no Nigerian has ever gotten a dime of contract from India. So where is the reciprocity? That is the reason why with all the doctors and doctorates, the nation is seen as harboring intellectual laziness that encourages the situation.

Similarly, China, the world’s largest communist nation despite its high level of poverty with about 800m abject poor Chinese, flexes its muscle in the world. A Chinese in Nigeria is seen as ‘Daniel Come to Justice.’ A red carpet is rolled out for the Chinese and champagne pop to usher them in. When will a black person the world over be respected and treated like black people treat others? 

Nigeria should not accept anything from Iran as far as housing is concerned. Nigeria should create an index of nations and sectors they want economic development relationship with. Nigeria should not open its doors to just anyone when most Nigerians are shunned and are badly treated in some of these countries. 

Housing is a simple matter to solve because 95% of what it takes to deliver it is locally present. If technical ability is lacking, Nigeria’s leadership should challenge all practitioners and professionals in the housing sector to come up with local solutions tailored to the local style. If money is the issue, demand that no foreign interest and/or investors interested in the housing sector invest less than $100m initially and in 5 years a billion. If they cannot sustain such investment value, Nigeria is not available to them.

There are no free lunches. Africans still naively believe in the altruistic nature of the West and her in-tow investors who pretend to want to help Africa but end up getting more. Africa is not a new invention. Come to think of it, the oldest human existence was recorded in Africa. So why is Africa still treated like a step child with a running nose unable to wipe the mess? 

The housing delivery can abate when all the challenges including but not limited to access to land ownership, lowered and level interest rate – single digit, longer debt amortizing schedule, Nigeria government becoming more responsible and responsive in paying salaries and wages on time, establishing competent legal system that are equipped to deal with matters arising as far as mortgage securities and its attendant legal requirements are concerned. It is hard to expect regular mortgage payments, a key factor and condition for sustainable housing delivery when federal and state workers; Nigeria’s biggest employees, are owed salaries month and years in arrears. 

While Nigeria’s real estate practitioners and bankers ingratiate themselves on investment returns one makes in Nigeria, the assets grade and quality are less than 1% and only fewer than 5 states out of 36 and/or cities are attractive for large scale investments. All Nigerians do not live in Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt. These are the areas one hears about wonderful investment returns. The rest of the country is largely overlooked and is practically in the 15th century. Nigerians should know that when investment returns come in high double digits, something is fundamentally wrong in such an economy. Anytime a foreign investor is paid, it is a charge on Nigeria’s foreign reserve, which cannot keep up, reason Naira keep losing value despite ‘Nigeria Rising.’

Empower local institutions as the primary sources of wealth creation in Nigeria and see Naira gain against the Dollar and Euro, at such a time, the economy will gain tremendously. But keep the door open for anyone to invest in Nigeria and in turn repatriate their gains, and see Nigeria remain a doormat. When FDR stated that ‘no nation should undermine itself,’ I bet he did not think of Nigeria or Africa. Nigeria undermines herself allowing ‘anyone and their grand-mom’ to have foothold in the country. I am not preaching protectionism, but my God, Nigeria cannot keep going the way it has been doing. It needs to set very high standards to attractive respect as well as quality. The quantitative approach is recipe for disaster.

In closing, if the 17m housing units often reported is close to real, and given the current manner of delivery, it will take Nigeria 34 years to achieve the goal assuming 500,000 housing units are delivered annually, and as far as Nigeria is concerned, that is impossible. If 100,000 units are delivered, then one is looking at 170 years. Iran is definitely not the partner one should have for that length of time or any country for that matter. Nigeria just needs to partner with Nigerians to achieve enviable milestones in answering to the needs in the country. Everyone else ought to be secondary and take a number.

By Ejike E. Okpa,
Dallas, Texas