Land Allocated for Car Park Can’t be Corner Shops, KWGIS explains action on Crystal shops

• Says building a gross act of impunity, encroachment into public land, and setbacks

Kwara State Geographic Information Service (KW-GIS) has said it is removing the Crystal corner shops because new findings show clearly that they grossly violate government’s land use approval issued to the owner on March 22, 2013. 

The approval was for the purpose of a commercial "car park only,” KW-GIS said in a statement on Sunday. 

KWGIS also said the illegal building conspicuously creates obstacles for urban planning, road expansion and environmental protection, key features of the urban renewal programme of the government. 

“It is trite to say that a land allotted for the purpose of a car park cannot and should not become corner shops which it became overnight," it said.

"Importantly, the land was originally designed as a green area (a garden) where civil servants, pensioners, and members of the public relaxed at the new state secretariat complex."

The agency said tenants occupying the shops have been asked to remove their goods, adding that the ongoing urban renewal programme is in the best interest of the public. 

The programme is neutral to affiliations as many defaulting properties had earlier been removed for similar reasons, and it will be unfair to give preferential treatment to any structures above the larger interest of the public, it added.

ESV. SULYMAN ABDULKAREEM, ANIVS, RSV

CHAIRMAN, KWAGIS