Paul Onwuanibe is the chief executive officer of Landmark Group, a leading real estate investment and development firm that prides itself on being a one-stop shop for business, living, leisure, and lifestyle. He is the owner of the $200 million beach resort that was demolished in Victoria Island, Lagos, by the Federal Government to create a right of way for the Lagos-Calabar coastal highway. In this interview with CHUKA UROKO, property editor, Onwuanibe shares insights on the activities of the group since the demolition incident, disclosing that they have moved on in spite of everything. He speaks on other salient real estate issues. Excerpts:
“You know, the government has the right of eminent domain, and so I have never argued the fact that the government has the right to take whatever it likes that is in the private sector for government purposes and for the greater good.”
The demolition of your properties is not something anybody would wish away, more so when the government says it won’t compensate you, insisting that the houses they demolished at your beach were shanties. What is your own story?
I think my story is well documented. One of the things I say to my team is you can’t look behind and in front of you at the same time. When things happen as they have happened to us, you have to find a way to recover. I believe quite strongly that everything you do in life, every experience you have, whether good or bad, is an experience you have to build on and to use to your advantage.
So, if our properties weren’t demolished, maybe we wouldn’t even be going through some of this exponential growth by now; maybe we wouldn’t have had calls from different African presidents or had the opportunity to sit with state governors. Also, we wouldn’t have thought deeply on how to expand and diversify to other locations, and we wouldn’t have been able to touch the lives of people all over West Africa. We would have been touching the lives of people only within Lagos.
It is said that every problem is a blessing in disguise, and when the door shuts somewhere, many doors open elsewhere. In this instance, a big door was shut, but many big doors are being opened as a result, and we would make proud of the people who have supported us through this process. I want to go on record by saying I am not happy with what happened, and nobody in my position would be, but it has happened.
You know, the government has the right of eminent domain, and so I have never argued the fact that the government has the right to take whatever it likes that is in the private sector for government purposes and for the greater good. So, as far as I am concerned, I’ve got to do everything that I should do to make sure that this company not just survives, but also thrives, and that’s what I am trying to do.
You did not talk about the compensation. How about that?
We have not been compensated. I have gone on record to say that if we get compensated, it will help us to touch more lives, create more businesses, and experience. It will also be fine because we have had serious financial struggles since this thing happened. But we’re not going to wait and rely on that. You know, they say that people can take away what you have, but they can’t take away who you are. So, with or without the compensation, we’re going to look for a way to move forward. If we get compensated, I hope it will help the various places that we will go to, including where we are today, Lagos. It will create more impact.
But you have the right to ask for this compensation. Are you considering any legal action to enforce that?
Time will tell, but the simple answer is no. I don’t think you can concentrate on two things at the same time. You can’t concentrate on growth and on a fight at the same time. You either go to the site where you shake hands, move on and grow, or you stay there and fight. I told a story in one of the speeches I gave recently. I said that the cow and the buffalo can sense a storm before it comes. The buffalo, when it senses the storm, runs towards the storm, which means that when it goes through that storm, it’s more aggressive, it’s shaken, but it gets out of it faster. The cow runs away from the storm, which means that the cow stays longer in the storm; it’s not as aggressive, and time will tell if he’ll ever get out of it. All my life, I had been both a cow and a buffalo. But this time, I have chosen to be the buffalo.
Given what has happened to you and other property owners, how would you assess the investment climate in this country, or specifically Lagos, where you find yourself? How safe are investments here?
Lagos is the fifth largest city in Africa. It is fraught with challenges, but every single challenge provides opportunity. I chose to come back to Nigeria—come to Lagos and face the challenges. My mother used to say, Don’t call the forest and shout that you are in a jungle. So, you won’t catch me abusing Lagos, Nigeria, or Africa because I had a choice. I went to some of the best schools in the world. I had some of the best jobs in Europe. I had a choice, but I chose to come here for some reasons.
I came here for basically three reasons. One is that I have only one country; two is that I grew up in Lagos, I went to school here, and Nigeria has given me a lot even though I lived abroad all my life; and three is that, though there are challenges, I want to make an impact. Where there is a challenge is where people provide you a real opportunity for impact. I have never met anybody at the end of their life whose only regret is they didn’t make enough money.
Most people, on their deathbed, have only one regret: they didn’t impact enough of other people’s lives, or they didn’t keep their relationships, or they wasted too much time trying to make money. So, I think I have gone on record before saying that whilst I may not be a wealthy man, I know I am fortunate enough not to be hungry. I don’t necessarily need to work, but I do want to make sure that when I am leaving this world, I’ve had a life and I’ve made impacts.
Coming directly to your question, as I have said, don’t shout forest and say it’s a jungle. I won’t be the one to shout and say, Don’t bring your money to Nigeria. I want people to come, but Nigeria is not for everyone, and Lagos is not for everyone. So, one has to understand the unique set of challenges in Lagos and in Nigeria and Africa as a whole. You have to understand your market and the potential of the opportunity, and then you have to learn the sites, whether your risk level is one that you can sustain in a place like Lagos and a country like Nigeria.
Read also: At Landmark, our entirely business philosophy is all about impact – Onwuanibe
The news is everywhere that Landmark is relocating, and a few destinations in Nigeria and beyond are being mentioned. Tell us about this relocation saga.
Obviously, 2024 was a special moment for us for so many reasons. In the last 27 years, we’ve built a business from the ground up—from a service business to a property business to a leisure and lifestyle business. We need to re-establish our tourism, leisure, and hospitality business because of what happened.
The second thing we need to do is to geographically diversify to lessen our reliance on any economy. In business, the expected can happen, and the unexpected can also happen. So, one has to be smart enough to figure out how to deal with those natural and unnatural shocks.
The question is, how are we moving on? We are taking out two parts of our business that are most efficient, most cash-generating, and most impactful, and those two are our event business and leisure and hospitality business.
We’re going to combine them, and we’re going to roll them out across West Africa. So, we’re going to create a template where, across West Africa, we are going to site those two businesses, and the reason they come together is because when you think of West Africa, you think of what we are great at, and these are our food, our culture, our music, our entertainment, and our sport.
So, this rollout is going to be a platform for all those things. The whole idea is to create a set of tourism platforms that Africans can visit, owned by Africans and run by Africans for Africans. So, Africans can stop going to Europe and America for what they need for their leisure, sports, and lifestyle.
They can do all that in Africa so they can keep part of this economy here, and that is basically part of what we’re doing to show that opportunity exists here for many reasons. There are cities that have the numbers, they have the platform, and they have the enabling authority behind them.
Over the next three months, we’re going to be in eight cities. We’ve had opportunities for about 15. We’ve had calls from presidents in many countries that want us to do this there, but we’ve chosen eight, and of the eight, we’ve announced three. Our aim for this expansion is to create more businesses and touch more lives across Africa.
Where are these cities? Tell us about them and how far you have gone with the authorities there.
We are going to Gambia. This is the first time I’m saying it officially. We’ve signed an agreement with them. We’ve agreed on a 20-hectare waterfront site, 10 years of tax breaks, and there are other enabling environments. When I visited Gambia, the hospitality of the people, the president, the ministers, and the investment and promotion council was unmatched, and it’s a tourism country that understands tourism. So, we really look forward to what we’re going to do in Gambia.
We are also going to Port Harcourt in Rivers State. There was much understanding from the government. The time it took to negotiate and arrive at a conclusive agreement for us to take over a long lease on what used to be called the Old Tourist Beach to create a new hospitality and leisure lifestyle platform was not long.
This was because they knew what they wanted; they already had a master plan as to how they wanted to develop tourism in the state because it’s a state that has water all over, and so we have a lot to offer, and I can say comfortably I met the governor only once. That shows how receptive the state is.
Lots of the officials, all the way from the tourism and hospitality directorates, the investment and promotional directorates, the ministries, and even the local people were all incredibly receptive and wanting us to come over. So, we’re very motivated and very excited about that opportunity, and the piece of land that has been offered by the beach is surrounded by water at an idyllic location.
That is about 8 hectares of land, and we really look forward to it. We believe that in the next few months, we’ll start our phase one. Right now, we’re dealing with site preparation, and the hope is that by Easter we’ll have, at least, part of our phase one up. Obviously, it’ll take a year to get it in the sort of shape we want it to get in before we start building the big structures like the hotels. By then, we’ll be ready for Detty December 2025.
Enugu is the second place we have mentioned. We have just signed the agreement. This is a 150-hectare site resort. The possibilities are limitless. This will become the tourism platform of the Southeast.
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