Residents of a community in the Festac area of Lagos are protesting against the Federal Housing Authority over a long-running dispute about the land on which they live. According to Channels Television, one resident said he had lived there for about eight years without any trouble, until roughly three years ago, when, as he put it, the authority started building a wall around the area. The residents say they are now appealing to the government to step in.
At the heart of the grievance is the residents' allegation that the Housing Authority intends to resell the land. They point to a billboard advertising a development called Imperial City, which they describe as a Festac Phase II housing project that has been conceded to a new entity, the Festac Property Development Company. To the residents, that signage is evidence that their homes sit on land now earmarked for someone else.
The residents also say that undeveloped portions of land in the area have been refilled by the Federal Housing Authority. They read the move as a deliberate step to reinforce the agency's claim of ownership over the disputed ground, strengthening its position before any further action is taken on the site.
Part of the disagreement turns on which jurisdiction the land falls under. The residents say the authority insists the place is its property and locates it within Iba, while they themselves question that framing and dispute how the area should be classified. The competing descriptions of where the land belongs have become tangled up in the wider fight over who controls it.
According to the residents, the way the matter was handled deepened their anger. They allege that, rather than meeting them to explain the claim, the authority arrived with police officers heavily armed with AK-47 rifles and two Black Maria vans, in what the residents describe as an attempt to intimidate anyone who spoke out. They say officials then went on to number the houses in the community.
The residents stress that they tried to respond peacefully. They say they reached out to the authority to ask what was happening but received no answer, and that the numbering of their homes continued regardless. Feeling ignored, they decided to take the matter to a higher level rather than confront the officials directly.
That decision led them to the Lagos State House of Assembly, to which they say they wrote about their situation. The residents say they were then invited by the Assembly, alongside the Federal Housing Authority, for the matter to be addressed. They have framed their campaign as a plea for protection, insisting that they are a peaceful community caught in a dispute that they want the authorities to resolve fairly.