You Can’t Sell TBS, NIPPs, 25 Key Assets, Lagos Tells FG

Lagos State government has dismissed the purported report of Federal Government planning to sell Tafawa Balewa Square, (TBS), in Lagos Island area of the state over the nation’s fiscal crisis, saying it is a legal impossibility.

Lagos State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Lagos State, Moyosore Onigbanjo who stated this in a statement on Wednesday in apparent reaction to a recent media publication on FG’s plan to  sell TBS and other properties urged the Attorney-General of the Federation, AGF, and Minister of Justice Abubakar Malami to advise the Federal Government against the plan to either sell or grant concession in respect of Tafawa Balewa Square, TBS, in Lagos Island area of the state.

Onigbanjo, in a statement titled: “RE: Budget Deficit: Government May Sell TBS, NIPPs, 25 key assets’’, stressed the need for Malami to stop the move until the suit instituted by the AGF in the Supreme Court is determined.

The state statement read in part: “The attention of the Lagos State Government has been drawn to the news report on the front page of a National Newspaper, dated October 21, 2022 that the Federal Government, through the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, is planning to either sell or grant concession in respect of Tafawa Balewa Square situate in Lagos Island, Lagos State.

“The Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) must be aware that the position of the Federal Government to either sell or concession the Tafawa Balewa Square cannot be valid as the AGF is the Plaintiff in Suit No. SC.508/2012 between Attorney-General of the Federation vs Attorney-General of Lagos State pending before the Supreme Court wherein the AGF is seeking for a declaration that the ownership of the land, building, monuments structures and fixtures better known as Tafawa Balewa Square in the city of Lagos is vested in the Federal Government.

“The suit is fixed for November 1, 2022 for hearing by the Apex Court.