FG to revitalize 46 abandoned housing projects nationwide – FMBN

The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria has initiated a rehabilitation process to revive about 46 abandoned housing projects nationwide. The bank said this would be achieved through a partnership with Shelter Afrique Development Bank, a pan-African finance institution that exclusively supports the development of the housing and real estate sector in Africa.

The FMBN Managing Director, Shehu Usman Osidi, stated this while hosting the management of Shelter Afrique Development Bank recently in Abuja, noting that the bank had made reviving the housing estates a priority. According to him, the intensified collaboration will help provide construction and mortgage financing to developers in Nigeria.

He said the FMBN is currently going over memoranda of understanding that were signed with the organization but were later abandoned. The purpose of this review is to investigate the potential advantages for Nigerians of this new cooperation.

Speaking as well, Thierno-Habib Hann, CEO of Shelter Afrique, stated that the organization was in Nigeria to further its development financing agenda and position Nigeria as a destination for investments with an annual remittance from the diaspora of over $25 billion.

He said, “We are ready to collaborate with FMBN and other institutions across Nigeria to address the housing gap. The challenges are there and the opportunities are also there. As a development finance institution, we are very well positioned to collaborate with the government of Nigeria and in this trip, we met all the leadership including the vice president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria who is fully committed to driving the growth of the sector and invest more in the sector knowing that housing creates jobs.”