ABUJA, Sept 23 (Reuters) - Nigeria is gripped by a crisis
that has left Africa's most populous country ill-equipped to
properly house its inhabitants, said a United Nations rapporteur
who also called for an end to the forced evictions of entire
communities.
The United Nations estimates that Nigeria's population is
set to double by 2050 to around 400 million people, which would
make it the world's third-largest nation, behind India and
China.
Against this backdrop, there was a lack of adequate housing
in a country where most inhabitants live on less than $2 a day
despite the nation having Africa's largest economy, said Leilani
Farha, special rapporteur on adequate housing.
"Nigeria's housing sector is in a complete crisis," said
Farha. "Existing programmes will hardly make even a small dent
in addressing the ever-growing housing need."
Farha, who addressed journalists in the capital Abuja, noted
that the last census was conducted in 2006 and said there was a
lack of official data for the government to develop an effective
housing policy.
"Informal settlements are ballooning where conditions are
inhumane and perhaps the most severe I have seen worldwide,"
said Farha at the end of a 10-day visit that took in Abuja, the
southwestern commercial hub of Lagos and southern oil city Port
Harcourt.
Northeast Nigeria has for the last decade been gripped by
the insurgency waged by militant Islamist group Boko Haram that
has forced around 2 million people to leave their homes. That,
she said, had added to the housing crisis.
The rapporteur also criticised the use of force by state
government authorities and property developers to evict entire
communities.
The practice is often carried out in cities, most notably in
the port city of Lagos, to make space for luxury housing which
is unaffordable for the majority of locals.
Farha said hundreds of thousands of Nigerians, mostly women
and children, had been evicted from their homes in the last few
years by people using firearms, arson and arbitrary arrests.
"A national-level moratorium on forced evictions should be
declared by the Federal Government, until adequate legal and
procedural safeguards are in place to ensure that all evictions
are compliant with international human rights law," she said in
her recommendations.
Nigerian authorities have previously said shanty towns have
been demolished because they were home to criminal gangs, making
them a security threat as well breaching building regulations.
And the state government in Lagos, which attracts thousands of
people each day in search of work from across Nigeria and
neighboring countries, has repeatedly denied reports of
brutality and possible violations of human rights laws.
The UN rapporteur said a national commission should be
established to investigate alleged human rights violations and
it should have the power to provide compensation.