The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has denounced the ‘Park-and-Pay’ on-street parking scheme as illegal, citing significant fraud within the contract agreements between the FCT administration and the scheme’s managing contractors. Wike, during a media briefing marking his first year in office, questioned the legitimacy of the revenue-sharing arrangement, which allows private operators to retain 80 per cent of the revenue, while only 20 per cent is remitted to the government.
Wike revealed that he was unaware of the reintroduced scheme, which initially launched in 2014 and was brought back in 2023 under a N908.3bn agreement with concessionaires NAJEC Limited and Automaten Technik Bauman Nigeria Limited. Expressing his disbelief at the terms of the agreement, Wike stated that he had ordered the release of a public statement declaring the scheme illegal. He criticised the notion that residents should be forced to pay for parking in front of their homes or businesses, and vowed to tackle the underlying corruption within the FCT administration that facilitated such contracts.
