Facility manager, residents feud over 1004 estate’s management
The feud is getting messier as both parties are jostling to undo each other. While the manager is raising the alarm over the failure of the residents to honour their part of the agreement and forcefully seeking to take over the estate, the residents differ, alleging that 1004 Limited has not been fair in the management of the property
THE last has not been heard of the crisis brewing between 1004 Limited and residents of the estate, as the duo have resorted to the Nigerian Police Force for intervention.
The feud is getting messier as both parties are jostling to undo each other. While the manager is raising the alarm over the failure of the residents to honour their part of the agreement and forcefully seeking to take over the estate, the residents differ, alleging that 1004 Limited has not been fair in the management of the property.
Addressing the media in his office last week, the Managing Director, 1004 Estates Limited, Mr. Samuel Ukpong, said that the management has been having dispute with some people who claimed to be the residents and homeowners association of 1004 estate.
He said these are not recognized either by an election or any other legal means, adding that a court of competent jurisdiction has waded into the matter.
According to Ukpong, the group interferes with the management of the estate by asking people to under pay service charge annually, declining gradually from N450,000 to N350,000 to N180,000 to N15,000 and now to zero naira.
The matter was eventually taken to the court for the purpose of interpreting the sub lease document and whether agitators have a right to interfere with the management of the estate.
Ukpong, who disclosed that the matter has been on for two years, said the court last week gave judgment in its favour, “that the operating document of the estate is the 1004 Estate sub Lease”.
According to him, the court ruled that because we have been having exchanging communications and correspondence with the group, it would be taken as the valid association on the estate.
It was also said that the Judge held that the association was entitled to know how the estate is being run. In line with the ruling, Ukpong said his firm has been working to comply with that order, adding that there are no difficulties on the accounts whatsoever.
Efforts by the residents to Messrs. KPMG to audit the account of the company failed because KPMG did not give Messrs1004 Limited a non-disclosure agreement; not to reveal other businesses of the company apart from the service charge.
“Besides, one of the firm’s partners is also a member of the association.
What we now did was to appoint Messrs. Enst & Young, Price Waterhouse Cooper; Loyds and KPMG. Enst & Young was appointed to audit the service charge accounts from 2010 to 2014, but these residents refused to accept it in the past but now that the court has told us to give them the accounts, we will give them the accounts, which would be ready for review by Enerst & Young at the end of 2015.”
Regardless, our belief was that the accounts that we owe are to individual flat owners; we don’t owe an account to a collective group because everybody pays separately and everybody’s services are allocated separately.
However, he said the crisis got to a climax last week, when a member of the association broke into the estate’s transformer and tried to reconnect somebody whose services have been restricted; the person has not paid for three years. In the attempt to reconnect the person, they brought down and disconnected 120 units in the high-rise.
“We wrote a petition to the Commissioner of Police and to the AIG over the matter of which a warrant of arrest was made. Police said they wanted to give us an opportunity for reconciliation.
“Surprisingly, what we saw was a truck load of mobile policemen who claimed that they were from Mopol 15 in Ilorin and that they were sent to assist the residents’ association takeover the estate. We then ran to the AIG who said he was not aware of those policemen and that he did not send them”, Ukpong said, saying they have taken over 1004 and that they had terminated the management, without being able to produce a copy of the judgment to that effect.
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4 Comments
Mr. Ukpong is full of lies. These lies have been ongoing for 4 years
now. First he told the court that the home owners association is illegal and
never existed. What he has also failed to mention about the court judgment is
that the Judge berated him for coming to equity without clean hands. Mr Ukpong
has systematically destroyed the value of 1004 Estate. He lacks basic
elementary management skills talk less of the skills required to run an estate
like 1004 estate. It is laughable that Ukpong is accusing the same Home Owners
he has used the police to harass and intimidate for the past 4 years of hiring
Mopol. The case in hand is simple. Ukpong was providing a service. The
residents are no longer satisfied with his service and have moved on to employ
more competent service providers. Mr Ukpong does not own 1004 Estate and
therefore cannot impose himself and the company he represents perpetually on
the owners and residents of 1004 Estate. I, as a resident am not surprised at
the deceit of Ukpong in this write-up. That has been his signature, lies and deceit.
Since Ukpong was kicked out, we have known peace. We are just finding out the
extent of damage Ukpong has done to the estate. The collapse of infrastructure
after collecting Billions in service charge is unquantifiable. But, we the
residents are undaunted. It may take time, but surely the beauty of 1004 Estate
will be restored again.
Mr Ukpong claims to be a man with a history of service management for large estates and knows what is best for the residents this includes bullying, setting his own salary through a service charge that is not formally audited or agreed on by even the homeowners who own the flats in 1004 and not maintaining the estate. His role was a Master and Slave role within which he refused to apply the foundamental principles of facilities management – which calls that the facilities manager works with the homeowners and residents to set a service charge that has been validated and is fair. Good riddance to bad rubbish is all I can say. I have never seen so much greed in one person.. He was given so many chances over 4 years to work with HORA 1004 (Home Owners and Residents Association) but he refused because he was greedy.
is there a condominium act under the lagos state laws?if not then this is a good time for the house of assembly to come up with one…This is unfortunate,these facility managers paid 7billion naira for this acquisition and the state cannot just sit by and allow their legitimately acquired business to be taken over unfairly….all the issues raised here are usually addressed in a condominium act in sensible countries…for example home owners cannot decide who manages the estate until they constitute more than 50%,and by then estate sponsor will be forced to reduce his control over such affairs as is being disputed in this incident.We have a long way to go in this country.i can imagine if it was my 7billion naira at stake here…in my opinion both the HORA and 1004 estate managers have acted recklessly here.probably because there is no law/legislation on how this should be handled.very sad..We will always find it hard to attract investors in Nigeria…we are anyhow people,infact that should be our national creed…..lol
Why not just set up a mini power station using gas converted from the sewage disposal system……why burn diesel and pollute the beautiful Estate
We will review and take appropriate action.