The people of Umuatugbu Oma, a community in Nkanu West Local Government of Enugu State, have squared up with the state government over allegations of forceful take over of their land located at Onu Nyama by the Enugu State Housing Development Corporation (ESHDC).
The community said that contrary to claims by the state government, the land measuring about 34.4 hectares is an ancestral heritage and was not donated to the state housing commission.
It said that the claims that the land is “a den for kidnappers and terrorists” is just a ploy to forcefully and illegal take it away from them.
The people of Umuatugbu Oma also accused the state government and its housing development agency of collaborating with some unnamed individuals working against the interest of the community to grab their ancestral land “without prio discussion, negotiation and agreement to procure the Onu Nyama land for whatever purpose, under a mutual deal terms which is a proper and acceptable practice.”
The community said that it learnt about the attempt to forcefully take over the land in a media report on sunnewsonline.com of July 7, 2024 entitled: “Enugu Community Lauds Mba Over ESHDC Resolve To Site Housing Scheme On Area,” insisting that it had no such land deal with the state government or its appointed representative.
The Umuatugbu Oma community stated that when it donated its lands in the past to the Enugu State Government in the public interest, the gesture was well discussed and mutually agreed.
It accused two individuals who allegedly justified the government’s claims that the community voluntarily donated the land to the ESHDC, as neither indigenes nor tenants in Umuatugbu Oma community.
They further stated that the “green vegetation and the land was never a den for kidnappers and terrorists. This claim is a malicious and negative indictment on the good people of Umuatugbu Oma. ”
The community representatives called on the governor of Enugu State, Dr Peter Mba, to urgently intervene to save the community from the hands of those they described as “faceless land grabbers working in conjunction with ESHDC.”
Meanwhile, some prominent citizens of the community explained the circumstances of the land.
One of illustrious sons of the community, a retired Major General and the immediate-past Nigeria’s Ambassador to Poland, Amb (General) Christian Sunday Ugwu, and Dr. Josephat Ani and other leaders of the community, denounced the activities of the alleged land grabbers trying to deceive the Enugu State Housing Development Corporation (ESHDC) wirh story of donation of the land.
They, however, wondered how officials of the Enugu State Housing Development Corporation that had previously and legitimately acquired a land within the community for Rangers Estate, which is yet to be developed, would go from the backdoor this time to acquire a land without due process.
A spokesperson for the community, Barrister Amechi Ugwu, said that the Enugu State government, through any agency and proxies, never approached the community on the possibility of acquiring the large hectares of land in question.
He stated that the claim by the state government that the land is “a den of kidnappers and terrorists’ was false, as the people of the community viewed the claim as an orchestrated plot/ploy to forcefully acquire the land from the community for unspecified reasons.”
