By Felix Durumbah, Abuja
Panic spread through individual and corporate residents of the nation’s capital, Abuja, today as Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) moved swiftly to shut some visible business outlets over the latter’s failure to pay the statutory ground rent on their premises.
Sealed were an Access Bank branch and a Total petrol station located in high brow Wuse.
FCTA accused them of non-payment of ground rent for 34 years, saying about N6.9billion in total is being owed the Administration by several defaulters.
Ground rent,in legal terms, refers to regular payments made by a holder of a leasehold property to a superior leaseholder, as required under a lease. A ground rent is created when a freehold piece of land is sold on a long lease or leases.
The ground rent provides an income for the landowner. In economics, ground rent is a form of economic rent.
The closure of both popular outlets is perceived as part of a wider crackdown to compel obedience to the law and spark payments by debtors, with today’s shutdowns currently sparking intense internal movements,meetings and actions within several firms and others to stump up the owed monies to pay their dues.
Last week, FCT Minister, Barrister Nyesom Wike, through his media aide, Lere Olayinka, had served notice that, beginning today, the Administration would start exercising possession rights on revoked 4,794 land titles located in Abuja’s choice districts of Wuse 1, Wuse 2, Maitama, Asokoro, Garki 1 and Garki 2.
Wike had in the past justified the revocations, saying they were executed in consonance with Section 28(5) of the Land Use Act, which empowers government to reclaim land from titleholders who fail to meet the conditions of their occupancy rights.
In today’s closure, FCTA said both business outlets paid deaf ears to months of appeals to pay up or face the consequences.
In the case of Access Bank, it added that the premises upon which the bank sits is officially allocated to another firm, Rana Tahir Furniture Nigeria Limited, and not directly to the financial institution.
In a letter to the bank, which was signed by FCTA Director of Land Administration, Mr Chijioke Nwankwoeze, and dated March 13, 2025, the Administration stated: “The Minister of Federal Capital Territory has in the exercise of powers conferred on him under the Land Use Act No. 6 of 1978, Cap. L5, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004, revoked your rights, interests and privileges over Plot No. 2456 within Wuse I, Cadastral Zone A02, Abuja.”
The correspondence pointed to the bank’s alleged continued default in ground rent payment as reason for the revocation.
It continued: “The revocation is in view of your continued contravention of the terms and conditions of grant of the Right of Occupancy by failing to pay the annual ground rents due on the property for Thirty Four (34) years.”
It stressed that many prior correspondences and publications had been made on the matter in the past two years, yet the bank demurred to comply.
