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Dr. BAMIDELE ONALAJA, LAGOS State REDAN Chairman Tells City People
Recently, City People Magazine Publisher, SEYE KEHINDE, and Property Editor, ISAAC ABIMBADE, visited Dr. Bamidele Onalaja, the Chairman of REDAN, Lagos State Chapter. He is also the GMD, Revolutionplus. It was at his Ikeja office in Lagos. He told us how he has enjoyed running the Association, plus the challenges he is faced with as a leader. He also told us what President Tinubu can do for the Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria (REDAN), as a body.
Below are the excerpts of the interview.
What’s your general view of the real estate sector in the last 10 months?
There has been a drastic drop in real estate business. One major thing that affected the sector was Inflation. It has affected all facets of human endeavor in Nigeria, especially.
The cost of iron, cement and sand have gone up. Even the sand we get from our various communities here has gone up. And you keep asking, is this also as a result of the dollar to naira exchange rate? But we must also realize, that this dollar rate affects all our transactions. Because these people will buy diesel and other things.
But I project there may be a change in the next 5 months. There might be a reduction.
People are still investing in real estate but it’s a bit slow and the clients have to pay more and this is not good for off plan projects.
I was discussing this with one of my friends who wants to start a project a few days ago. I said no, don’t sell of the plan. If you have your money, you can develop your project to around 60-70 percent and sell at a premium because if you sell at off plan because you think you needed the money, they will buy it at the lowest rate, and by the time you are done, you would incur so much loss.
Let’s talk about Lagos REDAN. How has it been as the Chairman of the association?
Lagos REDAN has been very tough and challenging and very eventful too. I have wonderful members and I have very supportive excos. Like you know, I am the first Chairman of the association. I desire to hand over to a good successor. Somebody that will drive and do a better job than I am doing.
This year, we had a wonderful event in conjunction with LASPPPA (Lagos State Physical Planning Permit Authority. It was a beautiful event held at Oriental Hotel, VI, Lagos. Before the end of this year we are looking at our REDAN awards and our AGM. We are working but we want government to empower us so that we can enforce some things.
As a Chairman of REDAN, Lagos State Chapter, what would you say to the recent demolition of houses in Ikota Lekki and Oworoshoki axis of Lagos?
As an investor, I sympathize with the people whose houses were demolished. It is so sad. As an investor, I know how much would have gone into it. Having said that, most of the things the Lagos State government is doing are within the law. The Law use act empowers the governor to protect the land and Lagos State has a master plan. If you or anyone deviates from the Master Plan of Lagos State, the governor has the power to pull down such property. But the question we all ask is that, where were they when the properties were being built? Somebody approved for that. The government shouldn’t wait till the property is built before they act. This is not good for the state. It’s not good for the investors.
And in some areas where the government feels it needs to take over some shanties and slums, we can not stop them. The government has to clean up the state. We have many people living is shanties because those places are not in the Master Plan of Lagos. My own concern is that, once a place has been approved, it shouldn’t be demolished because I don’t see anyone who built such massive houses around Lekki without approval.
This is not good. It’s not good for business and it’s not good for the state. It should have been stopped at the foundation level.
Looking back into the year, as a company, have you been able to meet up with your target for the year?
I will say yes! RevolutionPlus will be 10 years next year. We would celebrate it big. This year has been challenging for all real estate developers. When you build houses and there is no buyer for it or you raised some funds for a project, by the time you get to 50 percent you have already spent all the money, that is not good business. But RevolutionPlus will continue to wax stronger and bigger. We have many challenges but we are walking through them. Challenges make us stronger. We have new projects. We have new estates. We are expanding and we are doing new things in Abuja now. God has been so good to us. We pray for the new government for good wisdom to see this country through.
What will be your advice to president Tinubu on real estate sector?
The first thing the government should do is to work on the dollar to naira rate. The exchange rate is not favorable to any business. He should mandate the CBN and the Minister of Finance to make sure dollar crashes. You know when you put more dollars into the market it will crash. As it is now, the demand for dollar is high. That’s one of the reasons why dollar is on the high side. They should push more dollars to the economy and also regulate some of these Bureau de Change so that their activities can be monitored. Because they are also contributing to the dollar rise. Presently, it is hard to import doors because of the exchange rate. I will be at a loss. What we are doing now is to make use of Nigerian doors and sanitary.
Also, President Tinubu should go into massive housing policy. They can develop two bedroom flats and one room self-contained. Houses that the common civil servant can buy with the National Housing Fund NHF with a mortgage of over 20 years
Once the government is ready to support us at REDAN by giving us land, we would build. The government should partner with REDAN, private developers to make this happen. If the president can do that he has passed.
