Ghana’s Housing Guru is Back

…With Multi-Concept Court Estates

By J. Ato Kobbie, Managing Editor

As boardroom wrangling leaves many Ghanaians in a quandary as to whether the STX Housing Project, embarked upon by government to provide affordable housing for Ghanaians, would ever take off or not, other housing projects continue to spring up unabated in many parts of the country.

One of such housing projects is the Legonman Multi-Concept Court Estate, currently ongoing in Madina. Unlike other housing projects, however, this one traces its origin to Legonman Housing Project, a project which took off in the late 1970s under a public-private joint venture to provide affordable houses to Ghanaians.

“This is the continuation of the initial REDCO Legonman Project, after Government released 40 percent of the land to me, as compensation for my participating interest in the project with Bank for Housing and Construction (BHC),” Teodoro Martinez Montero tells The Business Analyst when the paper enquired about new apartments springing up behind the REDCO Flats in Madina under his supervision.

“The best approach now is for me to finish the uncompleted portion of the building and structures. My mission now is to continue with what I started – to house the people. This is why I’m continuing with the same Legonman Project, but now under my own company,” Montero, who is Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Multi-Concept Limited reveals.

Unlike the original Legonman REDCO Flats, which were constructed with bricks, the new housing project is being undertaken with blocks, a development that Multi-Concept attributes to the unavailability of brick factories to meet the supply needs of the project.

The new housing project in question started in November 2010, with a tentative master programme of development to cover 36 months, and is progressing steadily, Ing. Seth Bright Attipoe-Denyah, Managing Director of Multi-Concept Limited told The Business Analyst. Mr. Attipoe-Denyah, who played an active role in the Redco Projects, said the first 30 two-bedroom apartments are scheduled to be ready for occupation in December, 2011.

It all started in far away Spain, where Montero, an architect by profession, set up a company, Tecnicas de Multi-Construcion S.D., which started doing in his country what he knew best – building houses for the people. However, an encounter with a Spaniard medical doctor, Dr. Lassi who offered to buy one of his apartments in March, 1974 and left to undertake a consultancy at the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Ghana, was to mark a turning point in his life.

GENESIS

“Dr. Lassi said very nice things about Ghana when he returned and recommended that I came down to put up the type of houses I was building in Spain here in Ghana, and mentioned the Dansoman Estates Housing, among others, as examples of real estate projects on-going in the country,” Montero recalls.

He said following up on contacts initially made by Dr. Lassi, he finally came to Ghana in September, 1974 at the head of an 18-member team, made up of engineers, architects, interpreters et cetera to meet government officials, including the Governor of the Bank of Ghana and Commissioner (Minister) for Works and Housing.

“We were then taken on a tour of the outskirts of Accra and also Tema, to identify a suitable site for the project and we settled on the area north of Legon, which stretched from Atomic Junction to the current Redco Flats area,” Montero narrates.

“We submitted a proposal and it was agreed that we entered into negotiations and partner the Bank for Housing and Construction (BHC) and after about four trips to Ghana, we concluded negotiations in 1976 and it was agreed that we took charge of the technical and management aspect of the project, with BHC providing financing, including capital,” he added.

REDCO Limited was thus formed with an initial task to provide a 10,000-apartment complex.

The Legonman Housing Project eventually took off in 1979 and the official Inauguration of works was done by Dr. Hilla Limann, President of the Third Republic of Ghana on 3rd April, 1980.

The project continued and the houses began to take shape. However, for reasons which are still unclear to Montero, he was arrested and detained for two years in the late 1980s, throwing the project off balance.

TRAVAILS

After his release in 1989, Montero was to face another shocker. He returned to the company head office at the Airport Residential Area, to assume duty, only to be told not to set foot at the premises again. He was deported the next day. His assets in Ghana, which by now included farms and the stake in the Legonman Project were confiscated to the state.

Upon advice from friends in government, however, Montero returned to stay in neighbouring Togo, after a short stay in his homeland, while his lawyer continued to battle to prove his innocence of any crimes against the state of Ghana.

“After one-and-a-half years upon my release, (i.e. in 1991), Rawlings sent his Ambassador to Togo to beg me to come back to Ghana because they had realized that my punishment was based on misinformation,” Montero recounts.

“When I came to Accra I went to see the then Secretary for Agriculture, Mr. Ibrahim Adam, as the Ambassador had advised me to do; and he took me to the Castle in the evening.

“When I got to the Castle, Rawlings gave me a good reception; he told me he was happy to see me and apologized to me profusely, saying that investigations have proved that I was unjustifiably detained based on misinformation,” Montero’s eyes glittered, adding, “he then told me that since the Bank for Housing and Construction was involved in the REDCO Project, I should go back to them to settle the matter amicably to re-possess my 40% shares in the project. The next day, I read in the newspapers that my farms and properties had been de-confiscated.”

According to Montero that announcement was only to mark the beginning of another struggle.

Tried as he did, he never succeeded in getting back into the project and therefore reported back to Rawlings, who promised to deal with the matter. However, for many years nothing happened.

“In early 2001, whilst I was still in Spain, where I had gone to spend the Christmas holidays, my lawyer called me to inform me he had a letter from the exiting President of Ghana for me. When I returned on 22nd January, 2001 my lawyer wrote to the assets confiscations committee, notifying them of the de-confiscation of my properties.

“Shortly after that I wrote also to President John Kufuor, who knew me very well because he had a brick factory in Kumasi, where REDCO had planned another housing project and I had visited his brick factory. Kufuor promised to look into the matter but questioned why the assets were not returned to me earlier until the eve of Rawlings’ exit from office. He said for that reason his Government had to investigate to be sure that there was nothing wrong with the transfer.”

In 2005 the Attorney-General, Ayikoi Otoo, wrote to Montero informing him that the Kufuor administration had no objection to the transfer of his stake in the REDCO Project to him.

Documentation of the transfer, however, was to take another two years and it was not until 2007 that Montero finally got a letter with the necessary documentation properly releasing the 40% of land to him.

The next stage was to identify and re-possess the residual of the 40% of total land acquired for the original Legonman Project, which measured 250.42 acres. Montero’s new company, Multi-Concept Limited, has managed to take over what is left of the land, which has suffered a lot of encroachment.

CREDIT CRUNCH

Montero and his team went to work and got technical drawings prepared and ready to continue with the project he started over 30 years ago.

“We started looking for funding in 2008. However, since the credit crunch in Europe originated from real estate credit, local investors appeared scared to invest in a housing project,” he told The Business Analyst, explaining difficulties in raising financing for the project.

It was not until 2010 that ACORN Properties Limited came on board with a financial package for 90 apartments, enabling the project to take off in November. Then in January this year, JISLAH Financial Services Limited, also came on board with financing for 30 apartments, bringing to 120 the total apartments now under construction.

Multi-Concept Ltd is still looking for a $20million roll-over facility as working capital to provide the total of 4,500 apartments it has set out to construct. The first phase of the project which is now called Legonman Multi-Concept Court Estate has 390 apartments earmarked.

PRICES

Montero emphasizes that his is no social housing project: “It is for the middle and upper income level.”

With each block having a standby generator, lift, continuous independent water supply system, and centralized sanitation management, the prices for the initial 120 two-bedroom apartments are in the range of $60,000.00 and $75,000.00.

National Award

While going through the motions to repossess his stake in the Legonman Project to construct houses, Montero was not idling. He continued with pineapple farming, which he started just on arrival to Ghana, and was adjudged the best national pineapple farmer for 2001. J.atokobbie@yahoo.com