Richard Nnamani is one of the elders of Ndiagu Amechi Awkunanaw community, Enugu South LGA, Enugu State. He is 85 years old and one of the oldest men in the community. He was in the House of Representatives in the Second Republic. The elder statesman spoke with journalists on the controversy trailing the alleged illegal acquisition of 1097 hectares of land belonging to Amechi and Obeagu communities for the controversial Enugu Centenary City. Here are excerpts of the interview.
The state government recently revoked the certificate of occupancy for Enugu Centenary City being developed by a private company, Private Estate International West Africa (PEIWA) Limited in a very large expanse of land belonging to your community, Amechi and Obeagu community. Can you give us a background of this entire episode?
The background started about 1983 when Jim Nwobodo was Governor of old Anambra State. He desired like every other Governor to build a university for people of Anambra State. He looked around and chose an area of land that belongs to my people. He (Nwobodo) caused that land to be surveyed but before he could go further with the acquisition of the land, his government was cut short by a military coup detat.
What was the size of land that Nwobodo wanted to acquire at that time?
When he made survey, he got about 318 hectares of land. He could not go further with the acquisition. That is to say, the land was not acquired. Our people were not compensated. We were not consulted. There was no notice of acquisition served on our people as required by law, and when his government was cut short, the matter ended. Successive military administrations did nothing about the new university. So, nobody deprived us of the use of our land.
When Chimaroke Nnamani came on board as civilian governor of Enugu State in 1999, he took the university to Agbani, his hometown. And even though one may say that Chimaroke acted in bad fate for him to do that, we heaved a sigh of relief because nobody would tamper with our land. Surprisingly, when Governor Sullivan Chime succeeded Chimaroke, he got a company called Private Estate International West Africa Limited. The company convinced him or appeared to have convinced him to give them the land, which was meant for the university, for a commercial enterprise. They did not stop at 320 hectares, which Jim Nwobodo surveyed. They asked for more than 1000 hectares, covering almost the entire available land in Amechi and Obeagu and this was without any consultation, without any compensation, without any notice whatsoever, for people. According to them, they said they were building a megacity. Our people opposed it.
Meanwhile, they had fabricated a gazette called “Anambra State of Nigeria Official Gazette No. 12, dated 27th March 1986, giving them right to acquire 1097.128 hectares of land. They said by the gazette, the land had been acquired for overriding public interest and more particularly, for the establishment of Permanent Site of Anambra State University of Technology. The so called gazette was signed by one Charles Chika Chime, Commissioner for Works, Lands and Transport, old Anambra State in the administration of Navy Captain Allison Amaechina Madueke, the military Governor of Anambra State.
What was your reaction when you saw the document?
We were shocked to see that document, which was completely new to us. We started to investigate and discovered that the gazette was actually forged, because Allison Madueke was not the Governor of Anambra State in March 1986 when the gazette was published. Madueke had come and gone and Governor of Anambra State was Emeka Omeruah. So, the forged document must have been backdated but God in the way he uses to do his things, confused the authors of the document and they did not remember who was Governor at that time. We also discovered that PEIWA was not a legal entity as it was neither human person nor registered company with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC). Our search revealed that there was no such registration like Private Estate International West Africa. There was no such organization registered with CAC at that time.
We also discovered that the survey plan on which they based the acquisition of the land (1097.128 hectares) was merely initialed by a private surveyor and was not signed by government surveyor. All authentic land surveys emanating from government are done by government surveyors.
As if this is not enough, we found that the transaction for this land between PEIWA and government of Enugu State never went through the State Executive Council of Enugu State. Our search showed that the Government of Enugu State, the State Executive Council (EXCO) never approved and never discussed this transaction. The people have despite all these objections, continued to bulldoze their way, assaulting our people, dehumanizing them with their thugs and acquired soldiers and police officers. Don’t forget that even the forged gazette stated clearly that the land was acquired in overriding public interests, in particular, the establishment of ASUTECH. This company did not come to establish university. The university had been taken to Agbani community and the company did not intend to build another university. It was purely a commercial venture between the company and some people in the corridors of power in Enugu State or the old Anambra State. That has been the ordeal of our people. We are being dehumanized and hounded as animals by PEIWA, whose only intent is to grab our land and dispossess us of our land from our forefathers.
Are you saying that you were not consulted at all?
As we speak, no notice of compulsory acquisition has ever been served on us over this land. No compensation has ever been paid to us, yet, Private Estate International West Africa is busy selling our land. By now, they must have made billions of naira from selling our land to whoever cares. It is a typical case of power is right. As long as you have Abraham as a father, you can do whatever you like. Mr. Kingsley Eze who is the Managing Director of PEIWA is from somewhere in Igboland and I am sure that what he is doing in our town, he cannot do in his own town. We have God and our God is awesome. We cry to him every day, every night and He has started hearing our cry. Consequently, the C/O illegally given to PEIWA over the land had been revoked by the good Governor of Enugu State. We are hoping that God will guide him to do what is right and that is to return our property to us in its entirety without much delay.
I was told you filed a case in court over this matter. How far were you able to go in court?
Sometimes, might is right. We filed a case in court and PEIWA used its power, mainly derived from sale of our land to sit on the case. Since 2012 when we filed that suit, it has not moved forward as it were. The company got the then government on its side and they said that we had over slept our right and we didn’t come to court early. The court ruled that we had not and there is no limitation in trespass. They said no, that they were going on appeal. And they went on appeal and as expected, that is for them to buy time to continue selling our land and developing same. As you know, the mill of justice grinds slowly and sometimes too slowly. Luckily, the present government does not see the issue from the eyes of the previous government and appears anxious to put the matter to rest without much loss of time. That is where we are now.
You said nobody consulted you in the transaction and no compensation was paid to your community for the land. But PEIWA in one of its publications claimed that it had an agreement that the government should pay compensation to those who own the land. What is your reaction to this claim?
There is a saying which many of us are familiar with in school when I studied Business Law. One of the important things I took away from that course is “buyer beware”. If you don’t exercise that intuition, you run into trouble. You said you entered into an agreement with the government to acquire land, develop and sell and government pays compensation. It is not logical. I don’t believe that cock and bull story.
Even if the government said that, it behoves on the investor to make sure everything that needs to be done is done. If it is eroded, everything is gone. I don’t believe but if it was done, the Managing Director should be sacked. They said they borrowed N2 billion. So, they must have used the money to develop other places. That is not our business. I don’t care what they do with their money. That compensation is the foundation on which the investment is resting. Even as Managing Director, you cannot ensure that compensation is paid, you are not worthy to be there. If I am the Chairman of the organization, I will sack him. The Government should hand over the land as soon as possible to our community.
