₦2.8b hotel seized from Alamieyeseigha, rots away in Abuja

Chelsea Hotel was seized from the state’s first civilian governor, the late Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, and was handed over to the government of Bayelsa State on September 7, 2009, but the hitherto money-spinning edifice is rotting away in Abuja.

A Federal High Court, Lagos in 2007 ordered the forfeiture of the hotel by Alamieyeseigha after he was sentenced for corruption. Besides the hotel, the EFCC sold other Alamieyeseigha assets in Nigeria and realised N3.1bn; $441,000; E7, 000 and £2,000.

The money was remitted to CBN, in accordance with the law, for onward delivery to the state government. When the hotel was handed over the hotel to ex-Governor Timipreye Sylva in Abuja, the thinking was that it would be a source of revenue for the state.

7 years after, the asset has become a haven for miscreants, men of the underworld, rodents and reptiles. Shady activities are being perpetrated at the abandoned hotel, which poses danger to some shopping malls and banks in the Central Business District of Abuja.

Some of the miscreants have stripped the hotel of vital materials. An EFCC source said: “As at the time we handed over the hotel, it was worth N2.8bn. We returned the hotel to Bayelsa State with another asset at No. 2 Marscibit Street, Off Aminu Kano Crescent Wuse II Abuja, which was valued at N210m.

It is unfortunate that nothing has been done in the last 7 years. The land where the hotel is sited attracts either up to N800m to N1bn in Abuja. Yet the asset is allowed to lie fallow.”

The Nation