Lost your password?

The Luxury Apartment Complex in Lagos

February/March 2025Nigeriavol9-no1
Lagos

Photo illustration by Dami Mojid / THE REPUBLIC.

THE MINISTRY OF CLIMATE CHANGE X THE ENVIRONMENT

The Luxury Apartment Complex in Lagos

In recent years, Lagos has witnessed a surge in waterfront developments, mirroring the urban landscapes of cities like Miami and Los Angeles. Rather than fostering inclusive growth, these developments have intensified socio-spatial inequality while increasing climate vulnerabilities, such as rising sea levels and increased inner-city flooding.
Lagos

Photo illustration by Dami Mojid / THE REPUBLIC.

THE MINISTRY OF CLIMATE CHANGE X THE ENVIRONMENT

The Luxury Apartment Complex in Lagos

In recent years, Lagos has witnessed a surge in waterfront developments, mirroring the urban landscapes of cities like Miami and Los Angeles. Rather than fostering inclusive growth, these developments have intensified socio-spatial inequality while increasing climate vulnerabilities, such as rising sea levels and increased inner-city flooding.

When I was ten years old, my parents moved our family from our flat in Anthony Village to a home they had built in the hinterlands of Ibeju-Lekki—beyond the landmarks of Lekki Phase I, Lekki Phase II, Chevron and Ajah. Our house was closer to Epe and so far removed from the core of the city that people often joked about us living in a place that wasn’t the ‘real’ Island. Before then, we had only lived on the mainland. Living in Surulere and later in Anthony Village shaped my understanding and expectations of the Lagos experience as one firmly rooted on the other side of the Third Mainland Bridge.

A few years before our move, I saw a television advertisement for the Eko Atlantic City development for the first time. As a child, I had been socialized to view the Island and Peninsula portions of Lagos as the domains of the city’s wealthiest and most elite. Save for a few affluent mainland areas like FESTAC, Magodo, Gbagada and Ikeja, proximity to the water was widely regarded as proximity to wealth. Watching that ad, mostly intrigued by the animated depictions of the dredging of Bar Beach, I imagined that this ambitious urban development would allow more Lagosians to experience the amenities found in the city’s most luxurious neighbourhoods.

Many years have passed since I first saw that ad. I have completed secondary school and university, and now I work, but Eko Atlantic City remains a small, secluded cluster of exorbitantly priced, mostly empty, heavily policed high-rise apartments. It is neither an extension of Lagos’s true identity nor a space that reflects the experiences and realities of the majority of residents and is largely antithetical to my childhood dream of an equitable living community.

In recent years, Lagos has witnessed a surge in waterfront developments, mirroring the urban landscapes of cities like Miami and Los Angeles. The Lagos living experience now seeks to provide a shielded experience for the rich while ignoring the needs of the lower-income citizenry, who make up more than 60 per cent of Nigeria. Rather than fostering inclusive growth, these developments have intensified socio-spatial inequality while increasing climate vulnerabilities, such as rising sea levels and increased inner-city flooding.

But what are the roots of this trend?

THE HISTORY OF URBAN DEVELOPMENT IN LAGOS

To understand contemporary urbanization in Lagos, it is necessary to examine the legacy of British colonial rule in shaping the city’s spatial development. Historian, Anthony King, pioneered work on the idea of the ‘colonial city’.  In his 1974 paper, he conceptualized it as a, ‘limited area of spatial territory whose total landscape results from adaptation and subsequent habitation by a culture-specific and colonial form of social organization.’ In other words, colonial cities enforce separation: colonizer from colonized, white from Black, and so on. Since then, other scholars like Janet Abu-Lughod, in her 1965 study of the urban development of Cairo, and Daniel Immerwahr, in his research on Lagos, have further explored the interactions of colonial and urban policy and the impacts these have in the long run and on indigenous populations. They depict the colonial city as a dual city; on one hand, comprising governmental areas featuring Europeans, their architecture and urban design, and on the other, indigenous people.

Though Lagos currently exists in the post-colonial, echoes of the ‘dual city’ remain. I interpret the idea of the dual city in two ways: first, through socio-economic stratification, where wealth determines access to quality housing and even security; second, through environmental vulnerability, where low-income communities bear the burden of climate risk.

Immerwahr, a professor of History at Northwestern University, in his 2019 paper outlines two major phases of Lagos’s urban evolution. The first involved the creation of a post-independence architectural image, as the city sought to establish an identity distinct from its colonizing power. The second phase saw the Nigerian government assume responsibility for housing the population. However, this commitment was short-lived; since then, administrations have shifted toward neoliberal market-driven urban policies, which have paved the way for elite-focused real estate developments. This shift has only worsened inequality levels, with luxury projects occupying prime land while the majority of Lagos residents grapple with housing insecurity, with over 70 per cent of residents living in informal housing settlements or slums.

shop the republic

shop the republic

THE LUXURY APARTMENT BOOM

The 2024 Economist Intelligence Unit Global Liveability Ranking placed Lagos as the fourth least liveable city out of 172 global cities, citing inadequate infrastructure and extreme housing deficits as the primary concerns. With an estimated housing shortfall of 3.3 million units, nearly 75 per cent of Lagosians live in informal housing settlements, according to a 2021 World Bank report. Yet, instead of addressing this crisis, urban development policies increasingly cater to high-income individuals, fuelling a luxury real estate boom that fails to address the housing needs of the majority.

The World Bank estimates that Lagos is one of Africa’s largest and fastest-growing megacities, with an annual population growth rate of about three per cent, surpassing Nigeria’s national average of 2.6 per cent. With projections placing Lagos as the world’s most populous city by 2100, housing demand is set to surge. However, rather than investing in affordable housing plans, the Lagos State government has embraced a profit-driven urban model, ceding control to private developers whose primary interest is capital accumulation. This has led to what I call the ‘Miamification’ of Lagos: a process where urban planning prioritizes waterfront residencies while neglecting broader socio-economics and environmental concerns within the scope of the city. In Miami, luxury condo developments have pushed out working-class residents through a process often called ‘climate gentrification’, and popularized by researchers, Jesse M. Keenan, Thomas Hill and Anurag Gumber, in 2018. In this process, wealthier buyers seek out areas slightly elevated above sea level, leaving low-income communities more exposed to flooding. Lagos is undergoing a similar transformation, albeit in an even more unpredictable ecological climate.

A 2022 report released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change highlights the dangers of waterfront construction. Coastal developments, like Eko Atlantic and estates in the Lekki region, pose several environmental risks, including shoreline erosion, habitat destruction, reduced water quality and heightened flood vulnerability due to sea level rise. Like Miami, Lagos lacks the robust infrastructure required for climate resilience. The unregulated dredging and sandfilling required for constructing these luxury projects disrupt marine ecosystems and exacerbate Lagos’s existing climate challenges. Each year, reports of contaminated water in Lekki estates and severe flooding in Victoria Island illustrate the consequences of this unsustainable urban planning approach.

Though high-income residents appear to be at the forefront of climate disaster exposure, the true victims are Lagos’ poorest communities. The displacement of informal settlements, combined with rising property values, forces low-income residents into even more precarious living conditions, stripping them not only of economic security but also of safety and access to essential services.

shop the republic

shop the republic

SOCIO-SPATIAL ALLOCATION AND INEQUALITY

In Lekki Phase II, the Circle Mall is a symbol of Lagos’s widening socio-spatial and socio-economic inequality. Before its construction, the site was home to a community—people who had lived and worked there for years. Branded as a ‘slum’ by the city government and private developers, the settlement was demolished, its residents were forcibly displaced, and no relocation plans were made. As a result, many from this community resettled in makeshift housing behind the mall, hidden from view and living in extreme poverty. Many of Lagos’s luxury developments share similar histories. For decades, indigenous fishing communities like Itedo and Otodo Gbame have been forcibly evicted to make way for high-end apartment construction.

Even within Lagos’s elite neighbourhoods, this exclusion manifests in social attitudes. In 2021, a viral video circulated on Twitter (now X). Featuring aerial footage of Ikoyi and Banana Island, the video contrasted these areas with lower-income neighbourhoods, depicting the way of life in the latter as an existential threat to Ikoyi’s elite residents. The language described Ikoyi as ‘under siege’ by working-class people, urging residents to ‘secure’ the area. The video’s narrative—comparing Ikoyi’s luxury towers to the ‘undesirable’ environs of Ajegunle—highlighted a broader cultural mindset in Lagos: the belief that wealthier citizens deserve protection from the urban poor.

Therein lies the paradox of Lagos: it aspires to be an ultra-modern megacity, yet it exists within one of the world’s poorest countries. This contradiction raises a fundamental question: where does the working class fit into Lagos’s future? As luxury housing encroaches upon every available space, the city’s working-class population faces an existential crisis: they are pushed further to the margins, yet they remain essential to the fabric of the economy that sustains and caters to the elite.

The failures of the Nigerian state and poor economic conditions allow certain social norms to thrive. For many estates and luxury homes in Lagos, the entire premise of ‘luxury’ sits on the ability to provide basic necessities for those who live in them. Lagos’s so-called luxury experience is a facade. This luxury is often defined by access to basic amenities: stable electricity, clean water and security. The failures of the Nigerian state to provide these necessities give room for this luxury estate market to exist and thrive. A 2019 report by the World Bank showed that it costs about $50,000, compared to $36,000 in South Africa and $26,000 in India, to build a single-family, three-bedroom home in Nigeria in a location with access to public amenities. For the average working-class individual in Lagos, the yearly income is much less than N2 million ($1,000), meaning that most of the city’s inhabitants are priced out of good-quality accommodation.

shop the republic

shop the republic

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF LAGOS’S CLIMATE CONCERNS

The city of Lagos faces severe environmental obstacles that threaten the housing quality, public health and economic stability of its residents. Research by Financial Sector Deepening Africa shows that the frequency, magnitude and spatial extent of floods have increased since 2000. The combination of climate change and anthropogenic activities stemming from rapid urbanization continues to strain Lagos’s ability to provide sustainable living conditions.

A United Nations research paper released in 2022 estimates the cost of flooding damages in Lagos to be close to $4 billion a year. These costs are derived from a combination of infrastructure damages, economic productivity and mortality. In 2024, the GDP of Lagos hit a N41 trillion landmark ($26 billion). Estimates on flooding losses show that the commercial capital of Nigeria loses about a fourth of its earnings to flood-related damages every year. This means that these environmental disasters stifle the economy of Lagos and contribute to worsening the economic welfare of its residents. Rising sea levels and a sink rate of up to ~87 mm per year, mean that the devastation from flooding will only worsen if action to improve the city’s climate resilience and adaptability is not taken.

The construction of luxury waterfront real estate also contributes to the erosion of the coastline. Already, 84 per cent of the Lagos shoreline has eroded in the last half century, degrading at an average rate of 2.6 meters a year. This erosion stems mainly from rapid urban development and the sand mining trade that supports the construction industry. If the city continues on its current spatial development path, prioritizing luxury coastal apartments over sustainable options, it is at risk of becoming inhabitable by 2100. With nearly 80 per cent of the population living in informal housing settlements, these climatic concerns become even more urgent, threatening widespread permanent displacement, loss of life, and the destruction of livelihoods for the people of Lagos.

Investing in coastal infrastructure has significant long-term economic implications, particularly for cities vulnerable to climate change and rising sea levels. One economic consideration is the long-term cost-effectiveness of infrastructure investment. Clare Balboni, an economist at the London School of Economics, conducts research that exemplifies how poorly planned infrastructure can lead to inefficient capital allocation, trapping cities in unsustainable development paths. In her study, ‘In Harm’s Way? Infrastructure Investments and the Persistence of Coastal Cities’, Balboni examines the economic consequences of coastal infrastructure investments in Vietnam amid in the face of ongoing and future climate change. Her research reveals that favouring coastal regions for infrastructure development can lead to significant welfare losses, especially as these areas become increasingly vulnerable to climate disasters and rising sea levels. More specifically, her analysis indicates that reallocating infrastructure investments away from vulnerable coastal zones could result in welfare gains of up to 72 per cent compared to current development strategies. Her research finds that in the face of ongoing and future climate change the gains from investing in infrastructure further away from environmentally vulnerable areas are significant. These results make a stronger case for non-waterfront housing infrastructure in Lagos.

Climate disasters in Lagos, mostly through the form of yearly flooding, contribute to the destruction of critical infrastructure for citizens. Sea-level rise and coastal erosion devastate the economic ecosystem of Lagos by destroying markets, schools, hospitals, roads, homes and other physical aspects of the city’s makeup. While floods affect the entirety of the city, in most cases, the effects of flooding are spatially unequal. Luxury developments in Lagos contribute to climate concerns through their construction and encroachment of the Lagos shoreline but protect those who inhabit them from the city’s environmental devastation.

Cities like Jakarta, Miami and Bangkok provide lessons on the risks and opportunities associated with Lagos’s current form of spatial development. For example, a research paper written in 2011 by Hasanuddin Zainal Abidin and his co-authors, professors of Earth Science at the Institute of Technology Bandung, shows that Jakarta has faced severe land subsidence due to aggressive groundwater extraction, leading to worsening floods and forcing the Indonesian government to plan a $34 billion dollar relocation of the capital city. Jakarta’s experience underscores the importance of sustainable land use policies and robust urban design frameworks. Lagos, which is also experiencing significant land subsidence due to unchecked sand mining, must prioritize regulatory measures to prevent long-term damage to the city’s coastal stability.

Miami is another illustrative case study, specifically within the lens of climate gentrification. Keenan, Hill, and Gumber, in their 2018 paper, discuss how rising sea levels are driving wealthy residents away from waterfront properties and into historically lower-income, higher-elevation neighbourhoods, which is intensifying displacement pressures. Lagos risks taking a similar path if climate adaptation efforts disproportionately serve the city’s elite while leaving other areas unserved and unprotected. In their 2018 paper, Matthias Garschage and co-authors, UN researchers, provide an alternative example in Bangkok, a city that has implemented solutions like urban wetlands and adaptive water management systems to curb flooding.

Lessons from other cities facing rapid urban sprawl and climate-induced environmental disasters reveal the importance of prioritizing environmental resilience over exclusivity in city planning. Rather than taking a luxury waterfront-centred urban design approach, the Lagos State government should take on the challenge of providing more climate-resilient infrastructure that caters to all members of society. By focusing on inclusive and sustainable solutions, the city can better prepare for its place as a habitable home in the future of its citizens.

Already, the city has taken some action to prepare for its future. In 2019, the Lagos State Resilience Office (LASRO) was inaugurated. Born from a partnership between the state government and the Rockefeller Foundation via the 100 Resilient Cities programme. LASRO is tasked with developing a City Resilience Strategy, as a framework geared towards strengthening the capacity of individuals, communities, businesses, institutions, and systems within the state to survive, adapt, and grow in the face of all forms of chronic stresses and acute shocks.

This initiative marks a remarkable step in the right direction towards fostering more sustainable urban planning and spatial development in Lagos. As climate change and rapid urbanization continue to shape the future of the city, partnerships like this will equip Lagos, and its citizens, with the necessary knowledge and resources to dynamically prepare for and address environmental challenges. Going forward, it is crucial for the state government to continually take deliberate action to enhance the city’s climate adaptability and resilience. By maintaining canals, constructing stormwater drainage channels and maintaining the city’s existing drainage systems, the city can alleviate the effects of environmental disasters. A forward-thinking approach to urban growth will not only secure the future of Lagos but also improve the welfare and safety of its population in an ever-changing ecological context.

The ‘Lagos Luxury Apartment Complex’ extends beyond an architectural phenomenon; it is a manifestation of structural inequalities. Left unchecked, it will transform Lagos into a more segregated, climate-vulnerable city that prioritizes aesthetics over environmental resilience and inclusivity. If Lagos continues to prioritize high-end real estate projects without addressing the broader climate resilience needs of the population, there is a risk of creating economic inefficiencies similar to those observable in rapidly urbanizing regions where infrastructure serves speculative markets rather than broader economic growth and development. Lagos must adopt a more inclusive approach by investing in climate-resilient infrastructure, better drainage systems, and adaptive transportation networks to enhance welfare and productivity.

The city of Lagos has a unique opportunity to change the course of its urban growth. By integrating climate-conscious urban planning with equitable development policies, Lagos can balance economic growth with ecological resilience, ensuring that housing infrastructure investments serve all residents rather than just the elite⎈

BUY THE MAGAZINE AND/OR THE COVER