Former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu had in a television documentary said that the land on which Oriental Hotels stands was full of garbage before he transformed it into what it is today. The former Communications Minister however, disputed Tinubu’s claim saying the land in question wasn’t full of garbage and was in fact owned by Kembu Company.
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In his reaction, Mr Alabi said, “contrary to Olarenwaju’s claims, inhabitants of that area up till the early 2000s would indeed attest that the entire coastal line (stretching from Ozumba Mbadiwe through the Civic Centre/Boat Club, through the front of the present Mobil Office, to the Oriental Hotel, further down the Lekki- Epe corridor) was all refuse dump-site. In fact, there was even a very dirty fish market exactly opposite Mobil office at the time.
“It was the late Mike Akhigbe as military governor of Lagos that originally allocated the land on which Oriental Hotel stands to the Chinese-owned Wempco Group in 1987 — 12 long years before Tinubu dreamt of becoming governor.
“However, Wempco could not develop because of the obvious unviability of that shoreline until Tinubu came and gave a 2-year ultimatum to all allottees of the shoreline to develop or forfeit. The order by the Tinubu administration was after Lagos won the planning regulation case against the Federal Government at the Supreme Court.
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“That was when the Chinese owners of Oriental Hotel started to build and others too began to develop.
Contrary to widespread beer-parlour rumour and silly insinuations in some quarters, Asiwaju doesn’t own one kobo share in Oriental Hotel. The Hongkong Chinese Tung family that owns the hotel has been operating in Nigeria since the late 1950s and also operated the Golden Crown Chinese restaurant along Ikorodu road since the 1970s till they moved to the present hotel and they also own the Omo Wood in Ijebu Ode and are known to be close family friends of the present Awujale of Ijebu Ode.
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