The Federal Executive Council on Wednesday approved the direct purchase of 600 units of four-bedroom terrace duplexes at Bristol City Development in Life Camp, Abuja, for members of the Armed Forces.

🇳🇬 Here's What Happened

The new purchase brings the cumulative number of housing units delivered for military personnel to 2,656 out of a targeted 10,000 units under a five-year federal housing programme.

The Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Rabe Darma, disclosed this while briefing State House correspondents after the Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Bola Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Darma said, “The Federal Ministry of Housing and Urban Development presented a memo for the council to consider and approve direct purchase of 600 units of four-bedroom terrace duplexes at Bristol City Development, Life Camp, Abuja, for the Armed Forces. Mr President is committed to seeing to the improvement of the welfare of the armed forces, and housing is an important welfare consideration.

📌 Key Details

“This memo is a follow-up to a memo we presented earlier last year, where 1,556 units of housing were also approved for the armed forces in the Kaduna area of the Federal Capital, Abuja. This has now brought the housing for armed forces to about 2,656 housing units out of what was to be 10,000 housing units for the armed forces.”

Responding to questions on the high cost of federal housing, Darma attributed the pricing primarily to the escalating cost of construction materials, insisting that government housing remained heavily subsidised despite appearing costly on paper.

“Certainly we know houses are expensive because construction materials are now very, very expensive. If you take the example of a two-bedroom house, even to put up the DPC, the foundation structure, you require at least 1,000 nine-inch blocks.

“If you are in Abuja, Lagos, Port Harcourt or Kano, each block costs about N1,000. So just at that level, you can understand why the cost of those houses is high,” he said.

Explaining further, he said, “If it costs the federal government N18m to build a house to completion, we provide a subsidy on that house. If you were building it individually, it might cost about N17m.

“If the federal government is building it, it may cost about N18m or N18.5m because of contract pricing and tax. But at the end of the day, the federal government will still sell those houses at N12m.

📰 Source: Punch Nigeria