By ETIM ETIM
Residents of Prince and Princess of Estate are crying out to the Department of Lands, FCT Administration to compel the developers of the estate, Prince & Princess Properties Limited, to provide the necessary documents required for issuance of certificates of Occupancy. The residents say they had applied for CofO since 2015, attended several meetings and exchanged correspondences with FCT Administration, but the developers of the estate have refused to provide the Lands Department of Administration with the required documents needed to process the title document. The action of the developers has cost the FCT Administration about N3.5 billion revenue that would have accrued to it in the form of charges and fees for processing the title document.
‘’We have done everything necessary to process our CofOs with AGIS (Abuja geographic information system), which is a unit in the Lands Department; we have met all conditions and are ready to pay the N3.5 million processing fee per building, but the developers of the estate – Prince & Princess Properties Limited – are deliberately withholding critical information from the FCT Administration, thus denying the government of the needed revenue’’, said one of the Executive Members of the Prince & Princess Estate Residents Association. He added: ‘’the over 1,100 home owners in this estate are therefore asking the FCT Minister Nyesom Wike to compel the developers to provide the document to AGIS so that the process can move forward and/or give an executive waiver for the issuance of the certificate of occupancy.
According to a letter dated October 25, 2025, written by the Lands Dept to the developer, the developer is to provide the following documents:
1. Land use and site development plan
2. Building plan
3. Engineering infrastructure design
4. A-built survey plan
5. 3D Aerial photo of the estate
6. List of beneficiaries (house owners)
House owners in the estate are particularly exasperated that the developers have deliberately caused the delay in issuance of the title document by refusing to provide these documents to AGIS because of their personal interest, thus denying government of the needed revenue.
Another homeowner in the estate laments to this writer: ‘’It is quite inconceivable that the developers would block the FCT from earning its legitimate revenue from our estate. This is against the agreement the developers had with the FCT Administration before the land for this estate was allocated to them’’.
On Monday, January 12, 2015, the FCT Administration put up an advertisement in The Sun newspaper, inviting all estate developers in the city to ‘’submit necessary documents…for commencement of preparation of certificate of occupancy to beneficiaries/off takers’’. Two weeks after the publication of the advert, Owelle Prince C.N. Ukachuwku, chairman/CEO of Prince & Princess Properties Limited, issued a letter to the residents, requesting for proof of payments; receipts of payments and allocation letter in order to commence ‘’preparation to perfect documentation and ownership of plots and houses by individuals in the estate’’.
Despite the residents’ compliance with this directive, the process has not moved forward.
Since then, the estate’sy residents association has written several letters to FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike; the developers and Hon. Michael Chinda, Senior Special Assistant to the Minister of FCT, pleading for the process to move forward. In one of such letters dated July 19, 2024, the residents association wrote to the FCT Minister about the ‘’various illegal activities of the agents of Prince and Princess Estate Limited (the developer)’’. The letter noted, among other things, that the developer has ‘’refused/failed to provide the requirements for the issuance of CofO as recently communicated to them by the FCDA, thereby leaving the interests of house owners in jeopardy with regards to the recent efforts of the Minister on the issuance of the CofO’’.
Prince and Princess Estate is one of the foremost gated communities in Abuja, with about 1, 1000 homes and over 7,000 residents.
ETIM ETIM is a veteran journalist and PR professional with over 35 years of cognate experience.
He is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Policy & Politics (www.policyandpolitics.com.ng), an online newspaper dedicated to insightful analysis of Nigerian news and world’s report. He is also a columnist with BusinessDay and The Cable and is a regular contributor to other newspapers.
Contact: +234802 3159969 (WhatsApp Only)
