KAIMA (BAYELSA) – Owners of the land acquired by the Bayelsa State Government for the establishment of Kaima Model Secondary School have renewed their appeal to government to compensate them.
Mrs. Ibumia Offin, spokesperson of the property owners, made the appeal in an interview with newsmen in Yenagoa.
It will be recalled that the state government had in 2013 revoked the rights of occupancy of all parcels of land marked out in the state for the establishment of Model Schools.
Offin said that they had waited for two years for government to compensate them for their land, but all to no avail.
She said that the land owners needed the funds to enable them to resettle elsewhere, since their houses had been demolished to make way for the erection of the classrooms.
According to her, the property owners, many of whom were widows, would be compelled to move into the schools’ classrooms to protest the continued withholding of the compensation.
“We will pack our belongings together with our children and return there, if government fails to settle us in the next two weeks,” Offin said.
“We have gone through a lot of hardships. We were displaced since two years ago and we have completed all documentations and government has verified our claims.
“We have been putting up with relatives and have become liabilities to them. We cannot be squatting endlessly with relatives, the situation has become unbearable.
“We have made several appeals to government to expedite action on payment of the compensation but nothing has been done,” she said.
A competent source at the state’s Ministry of Lands and Survey said that the ministry had concluded the assessment and verification of the title documents tendered by the property owners.
The source, who pleaded for anonymity, however, said that no fund had been provided for the ministry for the payment of the compensation.
