Lagos Assembly moves to repeal land use law

Lawmakers in the Lagos Assembly have begun moves to enhance a law that will help repeal the Land Use Charge law currently in use in the state.

A step to actualising this objective received a boost when the bill to that effect went through second reading on the floor of the House during plenary on Thursday.

The law tagged: “A Bill for A Law To Repeal The Land Use Charge Law 2001 and Enact Land Use Charge 2017 and For Connected Purposes” was subsequently committed to the House as hoc committee on finance headed by Hon. Yinka Ogundimu.

According to the Speaker of the House, Rt. Hon. Mudashiru Obasa, the law was all about increasing the revenue generation of the state.

Obasa observed that a situation, where a few consultants were working with the state governments on the collection of land use charges was not good enough while calling for an increase in the number of such consultants.

“We need more consultants to do the job so that the entire state could be covered in the collection of land use charges. Whatever tribunal that would be set-up to deal with offenders should have the support of the government.

“On the issue of exemptions, we cannot exempt religious organizations because most of the worship centres are making money. We could only exempt Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs),” he said.

The Majority Leader of the House, Hon. Sanai Agunbiade stated that the bill would repeal the existing law on land use charge, adding that it was an executive bill.

He stressed that the bill would prohibit the application of other relevant laws relating to land use.