On Wednesday, a Federal Capital Territory High Court in Jikwoyi, Abuja, restrained the FCTA from destroying further properties at Trademore Estate, also known as Plot 1981, Sabon Lugbe.
Trademore International Holding Nigeria Ltd. filed an exparte request, and Judge Zubairu Mohammed ruled ( developers of Trademore Estate, Lugbe, Abuja ).
The Minister of FCT, FCDA, AMMC, and AMAC are respondents in the lawsuit ( AMAC ).
The AMMC classified the estate a “disaster zone” following severe rains a few days earlier.
The developers contested the agency’s assertion that the estate was built without consent.
In the main suit filed on behalf of Trademore Estate, Mike Ozekhome, SAN, told the court that relevant agencies had engaged in illegal, wanton, and unconscionable demolition of buildings belonging to innocent occupants “when it was manifestly clear that the three floodings ever experienced in the estate since it was built in 2007, were all caused, not by the Plaintiff or occupants of the estate, but by acts of gross negligence occasioned by the Defendants; or
In the ex parte application presented by Ozekhome’s team member Benson Igbanoi, the agency threatened to destroy Trademore Estate in Lugbe, Abuja, citing flooding difficulties and had already designated roughly 60 properties for destruction.
The plaintiffs claimed that the estate would not have flooded if the Defendants, through the Ecological Fund, had not built a very narrow carnal instead of a huge bridge to allow free passage of water from a now broken down and disused dam that runs through several adjoining settlements, coupled with several unstrained excavator acts of other developers in the area.
The court, therefore, ordered the parties to maintain the status quo and prohibited all Defendants from invading or destroying the estate or any portion thereof, including its structures and appurtenances, pending the hearing and resolution of the move on notice.
The court prohibited the FCTA from “evicting the inhabitants of the said property from it or in any way interfering with the plaintiffs exclusive right of ownership and possession of the said property.”
The motion was continued until September 22, 2023.
