A while back, I had some financial emergency, and was low on cash. I decided to sell land I had acquired in the outskirts of Abuja to meet that need. I discussed with my landlord then. He was having his evening beer in the garden and we had become close.
He said “Baba Damola, no sell your land. Go borrow money. Use the money meet your emergency. The emergency go commot but your land go don go”
I listened to his counsel. He would later offer me remnants blocks to start a house on the land.
Certainly it’s not ancestral land and land is a store of value that ought to be traded when you can earn more or meet a need. But land inherited must be well guarded.
Our fathers that struggled to buy large tracts of land and left it for us to inherit did so at significant cost. They lived spartan lives to accumulate funds and aggressively protected it from encroachment. Some died for the land.
Many of those that inherited the land and property sell for gratification. To buy a car. To marry a new wife. To show off. Rarely for purposes that are worthy. That’s why many are poor.
Land and property are wealth conveyors. They can guarantee generations wealth when well managed. We must start to educate our folks on management of property and wealth. We must teach them how to delay gratification. We must wean them from the now now mentality.
These are conversations for under the family tree.