Property owners across Nigeria are preparing for a massive showdown with the new Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Dr. Muttaqha Rabe Darma, over his alleged refusal to sign and release Certificates of Occupancy (C of O).
Investigations conducted by this medium reveal that close to 250 completed C of Os have been lying idle on the minister’s desk for over six months, with no official complaints or explanations from his office regarding the stalled files.
This widening bottleneck is severely affecting a large number of property owners who need the documents for critical economic survival. Some of the affected landowners told this medium that a C of O is not merely a piece of paper to keep under their beds for comfort, but a crucial financial instrument used to secure bank loans, raise business capital, and maintain personal investments. By holding onto these titles during a tough economic downturn like Nigeria is currently experiencing, they believe the minister is clearly preventing citizens from injecting funds into the economy, expanding businesses, employing workers, and paying statutory taxes to the federal government.
The concerned property owners stated that they have now resolved to air their grievances through a peaceful protest to the housing ministry, demanding that the minister hear their cries before the situation escalates into a wider public crisis. The affected individuals said they are ready for a showdown and have expressed that they do not mind if the minister outrightly rejects any document that has genuine errors. However, they insist he must immediately sign and execute the perfect files that have been completed without issues, rather than leaving the entire batch unattended.
Our investigations reveal that the properties caught in this delay fall under federal jurisdiction across Lagos and other states, including prime lands that were initially managed by state authorities before being ceded to the federal government. Reliable sources disclosed that while some files are recent, a significant number belong to land allocations that were made 25 to 30 years ago. Property owners argue that while fresh applications might require administrative patience, files that have lingered for nearly three decades should have been perfected and released without delay.
“What is actually responsible for the minister holding onto people’s C of Os we don’t know, and no one has been talking to us or treating our worries. At least, he has the duty to do his due diligence. This is something that has been lingering on for years. It is either you accept it, perfect it, sign it, execute it, and then give it to the owners, or you reject any of them that may have issues and let the owners know,” a concerned property owner, who has been waiting for the C of O on his 1996 Lagos land allocation, lamented.
This institutional bottleneck is not entirely new; it came under intense scrutiny during the tenure of Dr. Darma’s predecessor, Arc. Ahmed Musa Dangiwa, who later resigned. However, following Dr. Darma’s appointment as the substantive minister, the crisis has remained completely unchecked due to an underlying legal reality.
Under Nigerian law, there is no statutory deadline or legally mandated timeframe specifying exactly how long a Certificate of Occupancy can sit awaiting an executive signature before being released to its owners.
The foundational Land Use Act of 1978 grants discretionary executive authority to the Minister to issue these titles but fails to prescribe a maximum duration for this final phase. Consequently, processing windows remain entirely governed by shifting administrative procedures, deep bureaucratic backlogs, and political willingness. This lack of legal timelines has created a massive disparity between fast-tracked official procedures and the actual practical timelines experienced by applicants on the ground.
An assessment of these operational realities shows that while a fast-tracked file is expected to clear the initial administrative vetting and charting phase within one to two months, practical backlogs drag it out to three or six months due to unexplained document issues. Furthermore, the public notice and objection window, legally intended to last just 21 days for counter-claims, frequently stretches from one to twelve months and beyond because of delayed media publications.
Ultimately, what should be an optimal three to six-month fast-track process routinely transforms into a six-month to two-year ordeal, leaving landowners stuck in a loop of bureaucratic red tape while waiting indefinitely for the minister’s signature.
