The crisis that has recently bedevilled the 41-year-old 1004 Housing Estate, Victoria Island, Lagos with respect to management of the place may not abate anytime soon as duty tour by members of the Lagos State House Assembly on oversight assignment has revealed the glaring incompetence and abuse of power by some self-appointed leaders among members of the 1004 Estate Home Owners & Residents Association (HORA).
The group which could best be described as a cabal led by a lawyer was said to have illegally constituted themselves into a management body in charge of services in the Estate. They have reportedly given themselves the status of life members of HORA Board of Trustees.
Members of the Assembly Committee on Housing led by Hon. Abdulrahman Yusuf whose visit had taken residents by surprise due to the impromptu nature, were shocked with serious lapses associated with the general maintenance of once glorious Federal Government-owned housing facility.
As they took time to move round the Estate, their observation and interaction with some residents revealed much about the monumental financial impropriety on the part of the Lawyer and her group as the average resident complained of arbitrary increase in annual service charge without commensurate service delivery or accountability to the entire residents.
The Estate currently has 1,744 apartments with each paying annual service charge of about N650,000 and monthly electricity bills from N40, 000 and above.
The lawmakers also had a first knowledge of how facility providers or managers render services without accountability. This was evident in the multi million naira power plant where improper record keeping in diesel delivery services that had gulped hundreds of million of naira over the years was observed.
Records of diesel delivery and consumption shown to the lawmakers and journalists revealed a glaring evidence of impropriety as quantities of diesel which had reportedly gulped hundreds of million naira in the last few years could not be shown and neither were the plant and operations managers of the Estate able to explain what went wrong.
Chairman 1004 Estate Community Development Association, Mr. Matthew Ibadin said that some residents who possibly have hand in the impropriety in the Estate were practically opposing the lawmakers for coming to inspect the Estate without giving them prior notice, because they were afraid of the monumental fraud in the estate.
