It is no longer news that so many property swindlers go about defrauding people by way of obtaining money under false pretense and unlawful conversion without considering the fact that such fraudulent act is an offence that contravenes some of the Criminal Code Law of the land.
The yearnings and pains of a lot of people that wants to own houses and lands but were duped or treated unfairly by industry operators has prompted King Oliver, Chief Executive Officer of Forte Investment to reveal why many Nigerians are victims of property swindlers.
In a frank piece with reporters, King Oliver popularly known as Koler who runs a real estate firm along the Ibeju-Lekki axis hinted how bad the misconducted operations and corrupt activities of real estate swindlers has been, the negative effects and ways to avoid being duped. He further explained the difference between C of O/gazette and why the governments are demolishing people's houses and taking over their lands.
Speaking on the Ibeju-Lekki axis King Oliver posited thus: "Unfortunately, this axis recently has been picking up a bad image because some bad people defraud prospective land owners. We really understand that most of the lands on the Ibeju -Lekki axis say 70 per cent of the sellers of lands in Ibeju-Lekki are scandalous, so we are in the business to make people understand that it is not all about money or fees"
Speaking further, King Oliver took time to explain how innocent and unsuspecting Nigerians can evade being duped of their hard-earned money by fraudsters who pose as real estate agents. This is a good news for those interested in buying plots of land or developing property in any parts of the country as they no longer need to worry about being conned or getting a shoddy job as a reliable real estate firm, Forte investment has come up with a service that eliminates these concerns and puts a stop to property fraud in Nigeria.
"We are still working out some modalities to make sure we satisfied our customers. Most times when people are given gazette or excise land it is not even clear to them the meaning of gazette and excise. .
"When you said a land is gazetted , a gazette is just a book where all excise lands in Lagos are documented by the Lagos state government . What they normally tell people is that empty land is excised .But most times when you go and check the Lagos State gazette book there is no community that has absolute hold on all their lands because the Lagos State government from time immemorial does not give more than 30 per cent.
"So most time when they gave you a gazette to confirm that this particular land from this particular community is gazetted, we tell you that you need to take the gazette number and confirm. If you are given a gazette number to confirm you need to bring a Surveyor, either your personal surveyor or you just go to the Lagos State government, there are many surveyors there, for a token they will come and take the actual coordinate of the land they want to sell to you and then do a chart on it because when they say it cover 100 plots most times, only 30 per cent of that land is excise by the government .The other ones are either freehold or still under government acquisition may be for future purpose by the government.
"So what we advice most times is that whenever people presented either a C of O, governor's consent or an excise land to you , you need to do a physical survey by picking the coordinate to make sure that the land is genuine because that is why people are being defrauded .
"I can give example of some communities which I will not mention where the government has given them just 150 plots but they have succeeded in selling more than 500 plots.
"The situation is that the same gazette they would give to Mr A is what they would give to B,C, and D but when they go a government person will look at it and say oh lets assume Eti Osa Gazette, the gazette number is there, but you would not know how long the land stretches and before you know it, you have three, four people buying the same plot .This is because they would give you the coordinate because immediately they do the search , they would say yes the land is gazetted but they would not know the land has been allocated to three or four other people.
"We do have authentic land and we also advise our clients to bring in a surveyor because this is what most of my colleagues in the business don't tell their clients, that they should bring the surveyor to check the coordinate of land you want to sell to somebody. I have found myself in that same situation before now.
When asked by journalists to explain the difference between a gazette and C of O?
King Oliver said; "They are two different things entirely. In a simple explanation, C of O land is a land the government has satisfied as belong to a person but has an expiring date of 99 years while the gazette land doesn't have an expiring date.
"Most people when they say come and buy a gazetted land or excise land, they will tell you no, I want it to have C of O. Now Lagos State is 50 years old so if you have C of O in Lagos your land is 50 years old, in the next 49 years government can take it.
"So when you look at Badagry Expressway, governments are demolishing people's houses and taking over their lands, people don't know that Lagos government has looked at the terminal date .If you go and do a document that is 1800s, you know the land already belongs to the government. Those are things people don't know but when it is an excise land, the land that is excised has been given to the community who have been the inhabitants there for ages say since 200 to 300 years ago. So if you have such land it is yours for life .
"Then for a consent, you now want to ask what is governor's consent? Before 1978, it was called land certificate, later it was called the C of O, then in the late 80s and early 90s it was now called Governor's consent because the power has been bestowed on the first citizen of the state to be the one that will consent to all properties. So any excise land for a community is subject to the ratification by the governor and the moment the governor ratifies the portion of the land that he has given to the community, the land is theirs for life. Even if the governor left and another governor comes in, it is assumed that the new governor gave the order. That is the real difference."
Speaking on what makes his company stands tall among others he said;
"The information that is privy to our clients on the authentication of genuinness of land makes us stand out. What makes us unique is that we educate our clients on what they don't know about land. We give them the opportunity to do their research, and tell them what they need to know."
On the prime attention of his real estate he said, "We came into the business simply because we want people to lift the burden on them. While we want to be in business, we want the strategies to be right. Most of our competitors in the business hide some of the land information from customers. So we provide authenticity for land in Lagos state; we like opening up so that people can buy land without future tears. The burden of community, the burden of government, the burden of originality, the burden of genuineness, that is what we want to bear for the customers." He said.
According to Oliver, "Our company, Forte Investment, is into real estate as well as finance. In the next five years I want it to be a company that people talk about when you want to talk about integrity, or truthfulness, you will mention the name Forte investment".
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