When a System Turns Against the People It Is Meant to Protect -By Emeribe Kenneth Chinonso

I was returning from work one evening when a lady seated beside me in a commercial vehicle started a conversation about her landlord. With visible frustration, she narrated how her rent had been increased for the third time in less than three years—without any corresponding improvement to the building. As curiosity spread through the vehicle and other passengers joined the discussion, the young woman was moved to explain how the increments were communicated.

According to her, the landlord never consulted any tenant before increasing the rent. “You would just wake up one morning to find a notice of rent increase boldly pasted on your door,” she said. “You either comply by paying the new rent or take it as advance notice to vacate the premises once your rent expires.” Fighting back tears, she added that the house had been without water since 2023 because the borehole had broken down. Despite repeated appeals, the landlord had failed to repair it. Ironically, each time he wanted to increase the rent, he cited the supposed repair of the borehole as justification.

Her story struck a chord, as other passengers began to share their own experiences. A bearded young man recounted how his landlord and a house agent deceived him into renting an apartment under the false impression that there was a steady water supply. “There was no borehole, not even a well,” he lamented. “All the tenants buy water daily from Hausa water vendors (Mai Ruwa).”

When asked whether he inspected the property before paying, he explained that after paying a ₦5,000 inspection fee to an agent named Onyeka, he was shown around the premises. At the bathroom, he turned on a rusty tap and water flowed freely. Outside, he saw what appeared to be a borehole stand with two large overhead tanks. Only after moving in did he realise that the flowing tap, the borehole structure, and the tanks were all part of a carefully constructed façade meant to deceive unsuspecting house seekers.

Another passenger added that her landlady increased the rent on her one-room self-contained apartment from ₦250,000 to ₦700,000 simply because the FCT government had recently tarred the road leading to their street.
Listening to the stories of these helpless and angry Nigerians, I could not escape the conclusion that the system had once again failed the very people it ought to protect.

Historically, tenancy law emerged as a response to oppression. Under the feudal system, landowners subjected peasants to gross abuses: arbitrary evictions, invasion of privacy, seizure of property, and exploitation through unfair rents. Government intervention became necessary to establish a fair and neutral framework to regulate the relationship between landlords and tenants.

Modern tenancy law is therefore meant to strike a balance. On one hand, it protects tenants from excesses such as arbitrary rent increases, illegal evictions, and deception. On the other hand, it safeguards landlords from malicious or defaulting tenants. In the middle stands the government, wielding legislative, policy, and regulatory powers to maintain order and fairness in the housing sector.

In the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, this regulatory balance is glaringly absent. The landlord-tenant relationship is fraught with deception, mistrust, broken promises, and displacement. Dubious estate agents, largely unregulated, exploit desperate house seekers, often in collaboration with landlords. Some go as far as unlawfully ejecting sitting tenants to re-let apartments at exorbitant rates. Worse still, unethical legal practitioners sometimes lend legitimacy to these practices by preparing fake notices and frivolous court processes to intimidate tenants into surrendering possession.

In all of these, both the National Assembly and the FCT Administration appear unwilling to act. There has been no recent legislative intervention, no updated tenancy regulation, no policy direction, and no authoritative pronouncement aimed at addressing these challenges. This silence reflects a troubling indifference to the plight of low- and middle-income residents who rely almost entirely on rented accommodation due to the high cost of housing in the capital.

The experiences shared in that vehicle are not isolated incidents; they are symptoms of a badly flawed and poorly regulated housing system. When tenants can be deceived with staged boreholes, subjected to arbitrary rent hikes, or threatened with eviction at will, it signals regulatory failure.

The recent decision of the Supreme Court in Philip Kayode Olusegun Ojo v. SDV & Another is a crucial step toward addressing the challenges faced by prospective tenants in Abuja, where estate agents often demand and extort fees from unsuspecting individuals under the guise of introducing them to rental properties. The Court clarified the law governing entitlement to agency commission, holding that an estate agent is not automatically entitled to payment merely for introducing a prospective buyer or tenant to a property. The agent must establish that his intervention was the main and effective cause of the transaction. The Court further explained that where an agent, without any prior agreement, merely volunteers information about a property, he cannot subsequently impose an obligation to pay commission. In law, a person who voluntarily confers a benefit—such as providing information or rendering a service without request—cannot compel the recipient to pay for it. Applying these principles, the Court found that the agent in that case failed to prove that his introduction was the real cause of the purchase and was therefore not entitled to any commission.

Also instructive is the effort of Lagos State government to regulate tenancy matters in the State. In 2011, Lagos enacted a comprehensive Tenancy Law to regulate rent, eviction processes, and agent conduct in response to the demands of its growing population. Building on this progress, the proposed Lagos State Tenancy and Recovery of Premises Bill 2025 seeks to further protect residents from excessive rent demands, illegal evictions, and exploitative agency fees.

In contrast, Abuja still relies largely on the Recovery of Premises Act of 1945 and general contract law principles to resolve tenancy matters, whereas these laws are plainly obsolete and incapable of addressing today’s housing realities. The result is a housing market driven by desperation, inflation, greed, and unchecked agent extortion.

The recent assertion by the FCT Minister that Abuja’s housing sector cannot be regulated because it is “market-driven” only deepens the crisis. In functional societies, affordable housing and rent regulation are core government responsibilities because they directly affect social stability and economic productivity. Declaring the market entirely free from government scrutiny is tantamount to abandoning residents to the whims of landlords and agents—and implicitly suggesting that Abuja is only for the wealthy.

Even in a market-driven system, government has a duty to regulate processes to ensure fairness, transparency, and accountability. While it may not fix rent prices, it can and should regulate how rents are increased, how tenants are treated, and how agents operate.
The FCT Administration can act through policies, regulations, and executive pronouncements to address unreasonable rent hikes, illegal fees charged by agents, lack of basic facilities, and the proliferation of uninhabitable buildings. Like the Lagos State House of Assembly, the National Assembly should enact a modern tenancy law for the FCT, repealing or amending the outdated Recovery of Premises Act to reflect current realities and global best practices.

Local authorities should be empowered to adjudicate minor tenancy disputes swiftly and enforce sanctions against defaulting landlords and tenants. Landlord and agent associations should also be formally engaged and regulated.
Beyond legislation, the FCT Administration can adopt innovative tools. A central housing dashboard could catalogue all residential properties, allowing tenants to report, review, and rate houses, landlords, and agents. This would promote transparency, stimulate competition, curb excessive rent, and even enhance neighbourhood security. Mandatory registration of all house agents, coupled with public reviews and strict sanctions, would largely reduce fraud and abuse within Abuja housing sector.

Finally, it is imperative to note that leaving Abuja’s housing market unregulated poses grave risks—not just to tenants, but to the city itself. Illegal evictions can escalate into violence. Fraudulent agents can plunge families into financial distress. Displaced tenants may resort to sheltering in uncompleted buildings, creating security and public health risks.
Housing is not merely a commodity; it is a social necessity. A capital city that abandons its residents to exploitation undermines its own economic and social foundations. The stories shared in that vehicle should not be dismissed as casual complaints; they are urgent warnings. Government must act, and it must act now.

Please let me know when the paper is scheduled for publication.

Thank you for your effort to give Nigerians a platform to air their opinions on issues of national discourse.

Warm regards,
Emeribe Kenneth Chinonso