From Cyriacus Nnaji, Lagos
Advocacy, sensitization and campaign for the Igbos to take part of their investments down to the east was given a concrete impetus on Sunday, May 22, 2022 at Tetrazzini, Ajao Estate, Lagos, when management of Blossom City Estate held a Marketers Forum with promises of mouthwatering bonuses.
Blossom Estate a new Estate along Enugu/Nsuka Road in Enugu State has wonderful features, well gated, good road network, excellent security system, regular and water supply, among other interesting facilities.
Speaking on reason for the establishment of Blossom City Estate, Chief (Mr) Nneka Chimezie, a Real Estate Consultant and Chairman/CEO of Blossom City Estate, said her going to the east to invest in Real Estate is her own contribution to ensure the stoppage of the mass exodus of south easterners to other parts of the world for greener pastures, “Going to the Eastern part to invest in Real Estate is to make sure I contribute in stopping the mass exodus of southeasterners to different parts of the world. We realize that even though we go out to seek for greener pastures, we never understood the level of damage it is doing to us. I realized that this is the way the people moved in those days. You see people moving from place to place and settle in there, and another people would go and settle where they moved from. Now that we are moving, leaving our home state, other people are going to take over soon, they are just waiting for us to leave home and forget home.
“Now I said, what can we do to stop this mass movement, what are those things that attract you to go and look for money outside? And I said if we can bring those things down home, it will stop this mass movement, that is one and then it will encourage others to start coming home. So I now thought that if we can establish an industrial estate, not just the land, but to also make sure that people that bought into the industrial estate invest in that industrial estate, it will also give room for employment opportunities for our children; that can also help to stop the mass movement. This is one of the reasons why I chose to establish this real estate,” Chimezie stated.
The real estate consultant who is also prominently known as Madam Pinto, with over 15 years’ experience in the business, has three other estates in Lagos.
She also disclosed that all her life she has been into what she described as “Igbo wellbeing.” She added “I have been promoting akuruo ulo, I have been promoting Igbo language, so I have been promoting Igbo wellbeing, I am not new in Real Estate business, but this is the first time I am going to the east. So this is part of the aku ruo uno programme which I preach, they say, preach what you do or do what you preach, so this is part of doing what I preach.”
Chief (Mrs) Chimezie also pointed out that very soon she would be taking her real estate business to other parts of Igbo land. “Yes very soon, in fact we have plan to go to Owerri, even before the end of this year, we have plan to go to Anambra. These are the areas we found strategic for the Aku Ruo ulo programme. Like where we are in Enugu, it spreads across Ogbachala in Anambra State, so we have to link it and develop it as a mega city, as industrial Mega City, not just mega city but industrial mega city. So we are going to Anambra State, and in Owerri, we are also going to establish a Housing Estate in Owerri, because in Owerri, there are a lot of demands for house, not land. So we intend to go into housing estate in Owerri, because Owerri serves Anambra and Port-Harcourt. People live in Owerri and go to work in Port-Harcourt, people live in Owerri and go to work in Anambra, and Owerri is more serene and secure for people to live in. So we have plans, the whole southeast, to help and make sure we develop southeast to attract investment, to attract business development.”
On her conviction that Igbo people will key into her idea of real estate in the southeast considering the question of access to the sea and issue of security, Nneka said those there are so much propaganda against Igbo interests “You raised to issues, one security, two we don’t have access to the sea, But I can authoritatively tell you that these are propagandas. In the North they don’t have access to the seaports. Now to say we don’t have access to the sea is a propaganda to discourage us from going home. I can tell you, I never knew we have such mass land in Enugu, they would tell you that you don’t have land in the east, but they would not tell you that Lagos is the smallest state in Nigeria and yet we have this massive development in Lagos. So it is also one of the propagandas we are going to expose. If there is no seaport in the east, there is no seaport in Ibadan, but business is booming. There is no seaport in Edo, business is booming, now if you move your container from Lagos to the east, did anybody stop you? Nnewi people took the bull by the horn, don’t offload here, they offload in Nnewi, and if you go to Nnewi it is a major trading city.
“So access to seaport is for losers, it is for visionless people and selfish people. So what I tell people is let’s get started, when we get to the bridge we know how to cross it,” she asserted.
She said the Igbos can begin by moving some business to the east thereby forcing people to go to the east to buy. “If we move a business like all tukumbo market down east, any tokumbo importer should go and offload down east, the whole trading will move down to the east. I remember 10 years ago when they used to move container from port to Ladipo for N80, 000, and people that were living in Nnewi then would move their container from port to Nnewi for N240, 000, people complained and said it is too much, but today, people move their container from port to Ladipo for N1.4million, they ceased to complain, one thing is sure, we Igbo use propaganda to kill our own things. We can manage when it is in Lagos, but when it is east we complain. If we cease to complain and know that east is our own, whether good or bad it belongs to us, one thing that is clear is for us to develop.
“They say there is no seaport, there is seaport. Remember, Port-Harcourt belongs to us, Ikwere, they are Igbos. It is the same propaganda they are using them to separate us, so all we need to do is bring them on board, carry them along in this our developmental programme, you will see that we even have more seaport than Lagos,” Chief Chimezie stated.
