FCT MINISTER FORCLOSES RELEASE OF NIDO LAND LIST ...Advises Aggrieved members to go to Abuja

The hitherto promised release of the controversial list of beneficiaries of the Abuja Diaspora land may have hit brick wall as the Minister of the Federal Capital Ministry, FCT, Aliyu Moddibo has foreclosed any intention to do that.

The Minister had through his Special Adviser, Media, Diran Onifade at the heat of the crisis rocking Nigeria Diaspora Organization, NIDO, promised to release the list to douse any tension arising from speculations that the leadership of the group had shortchanged some members in the distribution of the land allocation.

Onifade had told Pointblanknews.com in an interview that “the Minister has directed the Abuja Geographical Information System, AGIS to release the list of those who benefited from the land allocation, so in the next few weeks the list will be released on the AGIS website.” This reaction came few days after Dr. Issa Odidi, a former Presidential Aspirant threatened legal action over the non-release of the list.

But after months without the release of the list, Pointblanknews.com decided to do a follow up and the Special Adviser, Media to the FCT Minister said “we are not denying anyone the list but it is not administratively convenient for us to release the list. We have over 4, 000 list and despite the fact that they live abroad that does not make them different from other people who applied and got lands. All land allocations followed due processes.”

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Onifade added that “we did not collect any money from anyone of them. The check that we collected bounced and if any of them say someone collected money from them for a land that is their internal problem. They should count us out of their crisis.”

Onifade assured that “whoever is ready among NIDO members should come to Abuja and check if they have been approved. They have to follow due process.”

It would be recalled that 380 Nigerians living in Canada, United States, Brazil and others were said to have paid $400.00 application fees each for plots of land measuring 950 square meter and 3953 square meter each. A total of $152,000.00 was said to have been realized. However, not every applicant was allocated a plot of land. Out of 380 applicants, only 338 were approved for land allocation.

Calls for a full disclosure of the list of all applicants for the Pyakassa, Abuja Diaspora Land have been rebuffed by Dr. Ola Kassim, former Chairman of NIDO America and Stella Onuoha an office Manager of the Organization who both coordinated the land deal, fuelling speculations of a possible fraud.