The Federal Government will soon come out with a national housing scheme that will be affordable to all Nigerians, the second since the Second Republic era of Alhaji Shehu Shagari.

Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, announced on Friday in Lagos while briefing civil society organisations on the activities of his ministry.

He said that presently construction of houses is going on in 33 out of the 36 states of the federation, disclosing that after construction, “the houses will be subjected to affordability test which will now decide when they will be rolled out.”

On electricity, Fashola announced that the National Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) will soon come up with regulation on metering to enable distribution companies (DISCOs) meter all houses. “The regulation will open up the space and allow for service providers and franchise holders come in to facilitate the work of metering by DISCOs and make it faster,” he said.

The minister also disclosed that the federal government is working on new regulation that will make it costlier for people to steal energy rather than pay the normal billing.

“Some Nigerians are stealing energy and the Federal Government will soon show examples with some culprits,” Fashola said. “Recently 11 million houses were metered only to discover a week later that about 8 million houses had been bypassed illegally; so government is itching to set example with miscreants,” the minister added.