Group demands release of N200bn CBN housing intervention fund

The Housing Development Advocacy Network has urged the Federal Government to disburse the N200 billion intervention approved by the Central Bank of Nigeria for low-cost housing, which has been pending for three years.

The Executive Director of the group, Festus Adebayo, stated that the release for the housing sector intervention loan was signed in 2020.

He said, “The loan that is to be made available to Family Homes Funds Limited is targeted at building 300,000 homes for low-income earners across all the states and the Federal Capital Territory and also to generate about 1.5 million jobs in five years. However, three years down the line, nothing has been heard about the fund.

“To the best of our knowledge, the agreement for the release of this loan for the sector development has been signed since 2020 but till now the disbursement has not reached any of the government-owned housing finance agencies. We are concerned about why the approved loan has not been released three years after all processes have been concluded.”

Meanwhile, the Executive Secretary of the Association of Housing Corporations of Nigeria, Toye Eniola, said there was no point holding on to the fund after approval of the loan had been gotten since 2020, adding that the need for the fund had been taken over by events.

He said, “This is an indictment of that the government and the CBN are not serious about the development of housing in Nigeria. The non-released has affected so many homeless people and has affected the generality of the people, especially the low-income earners. Hence, they are not committed to housing development. They are only paying lip service.”

Adebayo urged the CBN governor to tell Nigerians what was delaying the release of the funds while calling on the incoming government to ensure that the fund was released to support social housing provision

He added, “Just a few weeks ago, President Biden announced the intervention of $73bn, which is about N53trn for affordable housing. That is about five times the entire Nigerian budget. So, when we are crying about the lack of social housing to take care of the vulnerable people in our society, this is the problem, and it emphasises the lack of political will to develop our mortgage and housing sector.

“Today, we can say the private sector is doing better than the government in the area of housing delivery. While demanding the release of the funds, we are also determined to follow up on how the fund will be used at every stage. On the housing intervention loan, the CBN has said on its portal that the programme will house up to 900,000 children and adults (at an average of 3 persons/home) on a low income with a direct impact on health, education, and economic outcomes.

“Most of these people would currently live in informal settlements with shared facilities in unsanitary environments towards targeting people on low-income level across the country.”

The HDAN boss noted that as part of the efforts to address capital flight, the CBN also disclosed that the buildings will be constructed using about 90 per cent of locally sourced materials.

He said, “In that regard, the programme will deliberately aim to revitalise local manufacture of construction materials including doors and windows, ironmongery, sanitary fittings, concrete products, tiles, glass, electrical fittings/fixtures, bricks, among others.”