Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, has approved the cancellation of 485 land documents in Abuja after a verification exercise uncovered widespread forgery. The nullification affects applications submitted for the regularisation of Area Council land documents that failed mandatory authenticity checks.
In a public notice, the Federal Capital Territory Administration said the affected documents were confirmed fake following screening by the Department of Land Administration in collaboration with the Abuja Geographic Information Systems. Authorities stated that only applications that passed official genuineness checks would remain in the regularisation database.
The cancelled documents, listed under Batch I of the exercise, span multiple Area Councils, including Bwari, Abuja Municipal and Kuje. Several districts and layout extensions in these councils were impacted by the decision.
Under Nigerian law, all land in the FCT is vested in the federal government, with valid titles requiring processing through the FCT Minister’s office and formalisation by AGIS. Officials said the move is part of broader reforms to address forgery, double allocations and irregular land grants allegedly issued by some Area Councils.
The scale of irregularities became evident last year when the FCTA disclosed that out of 261,914 Area Council land documents submitted between 2006 and 2023, only 8,287 — about 3.2 per cent — had been screened, leaving over 250,000 pending verification. Monday’s action signals a tougher stance by the Wike-led administration to sanitise land administration in the nation’s capital.
