By Ben Ogbemudia, Jude Idu and Keturah Elijah
The Economic and Financial Crime Commission has concluded plans to collaborate with the Real Estate Developer Association of Nigeria to fish out fake Developers who according to them might have embezzled the government and decided to invest it into properties.

The President of REDAN, Alhaji Aliyu Oroji Wammako said this while playing host to the Chairman of EFCC, Abdulrasheed Bawa on Friday that they are working with EFCC to make sure that things are done legitimately.

“Look, we have what we call KYC, which is to know your customers’ ideology. We have also had causes we run with SUMO, which is basically on how to know and Identify customers.

“The fact remains that no REDAN member sells to anybody that comes, we must know you. So the issue of REDAN membership entails building affordable houses for Nigerians, not luxury homes and most luxury homes are not affordable to Nigerians.

So every REDAN member knows the people he is talking to and they call themselves real estate, if you are a real estate developer, you must register with REDAN so that we will be able to get your report anywhere, you must give your report to SUMO, you must give your report to NFIU,  many of our members do this report and submit to SUMO and NFIU but many of these people who are not REDAN members do not present this monthly self-censored reports.

This is because they lack identity which reflects in their individual signposts, in-fact they are Masquerade, you don’t know them.

Wammako also called on the government to understand that the land use Act which was promulgated in 1976 is no longer friendly to the system, which he said is obsolete but the law also stipulates that if one lives in an estate, then he or she must pay for facility management.

“Nobody is asking you to pay the tenement rate because the tenement rate has been canceled by the senate but the land use Act also has so many discrepancies in it.

I can authoritatively tell you that the law is no longer friendly. Such law has to be revalidated to serve the yelling and aspiration of Nigerians and also to represent the present-day reality.

“Obviously, what makes the Real estate development association very interesting, for anybody who is in the building industry, was because of the level of sanity the present leadership brought into the system.

Firstly, we were able to present a bill in the National Assembly the previous two weeks ago, secondly, we are looking forward to the public hearing coming up very soon. And we believe that archiving that would enable us to bring estate and product endorsement policy underway.

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“So, we also have synergy with EFCC, NFIU, DSS, and other anti-graft agencies. Again, in terms of the new financial regulations, which stipulate that we don’t pay VAT on properties rather stamp duty, we have established a very good synergy which makes it possible to protect the interest of our members.

“That is why we opt for the professionalism of members. It is what we call estate endorsement, we must make sure that clients have all the building approvals, you must have all the provisions in your payroll, which will be reversed in case of any problems or defects among all your structures.

I was a customs officer before I became an estate developer and the issue is that I have qualified engineers who are into the field, they provide services to me and I pay them.

So if you see anything that went wrong, it is from the professional aspect of it because the professionals have to stay on top of their games and up to date, too to ensure the standard.

“I cannot tell you how soon because of security reasons, but I must assure you that every member of REDAN must have a signpost in his estate a move, which we have agreed with the DSS and we have detailed our members and they are aware of that and if they are no signpost they will be taken and sealed by the government.”