The Federal Government on Thursday acquired 12,000 hectares of land from Jiwa Community in Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) for the construction of a second runway at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport.
This follows the payment of N825.8 million as compensation to people of the community to enable contractors move to site for the construction of the 4.2km runway.
The Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, revealed this at the official handing over of the site to the federal government as well as the contractor China Civil Engineering Construction Company (CCECC) commended the people of the community
He noted that the country has been looking forward to the construction of a second runway for the past two decades since the administration of General Olusegun Obasanjo and successive administrations have not been able to put it into reality.
Keyamo stated that a second runway will further open more opportunities for both the community and Nigeria as well as bigger aircraft will be able to land, more commercial activities around the area.
He said “For those that have lost farms, houses, and other means of livelihoods, I can assure you that you will gain more by the time the project comes to fruition.”
‘For the contractors I want to tell you that youths in this communities are able bodies I would like to hear that workers, artisans, labourers are been brought from other place to work with them, youths in the community must be considered first’
“If you don’t take them I will join them to protest, I will lead the protest against you, our eyes are on you, consider the sons and daughters of this community in your work,” he stated.
While reacting, the Emir of Jiwa, HRM Alh Idris Yinusa said the compensation paid to them is nothing compared to what they have lost but there is nothing they can do as public interest overrides personal interest.
He said, “My farm also affected, despite how big the farm was, meagre compensation was paid to me. I want to use this medium to say sorry to you and urge you to exercise patience; if there is anything to do about it we could have done it.
He however appealed to the National Assembly to increase the amount of money paid as compensation to indigenes,
“If they don’t charge what is being paid many people will die, the money given to us is not okay for feeding, not to talk of training our children,” he stated.
For instance, one person with about 30 children could get about N1million as compensation, he may end up sharing it at N200 to N10,000 and there is nothing we can do but the house of assembly needs to revise the current module of payment.
The Emir called on CCECC to ensure that they prioritize their people when giving people work, because I would not like when our people start protesting we have many unemployed youths, so the contractor don’t need to look elsewhere
“We know the Aviation University is still coming up and a lot of work will be there. So wish the people with cooperate and work with the government so that we can achieve much,” he stated
