Over 40 illegal structures defacing major roads and streets within Makurdi, the state capital, were destroyed by the Benue State Urban Development Board on Thursday.
The board has subsequently identified and earmarked over 800 houses built on waterways and drainages for demolition within Makurdi metropolis.
This was disclosed to journalists in Makurdi by the General Manager, State Urban Development Board, Town Planer Mede Ternongo.
He said the exercise was part of Governor Hyacinth Alia’s determination to revitalise the State capital, adding that the board was given the mandated to bring the city back to what it should be.
Ternongo stated that in the first phase of the exercise, they have been able to remove over 40 shanties around town and opened roads that were blocked by developers in the State.
He said that the exercise would continue in places where developers were blocking access roads and would cover the entire Makurdi city.
“We intend to open the roads, major access routes in the city.
“We just started with the Southbank area of Makurdi and very soon we will move to north bank area of Makurdi.
“If you go to north bank area around the Catholic Church, you will seen containers lying on the fence and it has reduced the road side and defaced the environment.
“Enough notices were served on the affected people because we don’t remove or demolish any property without giving notification.
“This time around, we involved the media. We did radio announcement for two weeks informing the general public about this and told the owners of those shanties to remove them.
“Therefore, the notice has been there for more than two months before we embarked on today’s exercise.
“The governor has graciously provided us with necessary logistics to be able to carry out this exercise.
“The governor has promised to give us bulldozer and payloader and operational vehicles to ease our jobs.
“I have discussed with the governor on the need to build a GSM village for the mobile phone dealers and I believe after this exercise I will go back to the governor and see how we can commence the building of the village.
“We have identified the spot and I have told him and he accepted.
“We have about 800 houses built on water ways and have been earmarked for demolition.
“Just recently, we visited a community around the naval road in Kashio layout and all the buildings that were located around the water ways and drainages were touched and we opened channel for water”, Ternongo stated.
He advised developers to always seek approval from the board before they embark on erecting any building to avoid spreading of illegal structures that could cause blockage of drainages and flooding in the state.