*Trustees must be guided by prudence, integrity and transparency, and assets held in trust must be managed in the interests of beneficiaries rather than for the personal advantage of trustees.
The House of Representatives has begun plans to amend the Nigeria’s 69-year-old Trustee Investments Act, to boost investment and tackle fraud, fragmented property records and weak consumer protection in the real estate sector.
Speaker of the House, Tajudeen Abbas, represented by a member of the House representing Lafia/Obi Federal Constituency, Nasarawa State, Dahiru Abubakar Sarki, spoke on Monday at a public hearing on the Trustee Investment Act (Repeal and Enactment) Bill, 2026, at the National Assembly, Abuja.
He explained that the proposed reforms were aimed at modernising the country’s legal framework to reflect changing financial and investment realities, while protecting the interests of beneficiaries and investors.
The bill, sponsored by Solomon Bob, seeks to repeal and replace the existing Trustee Investments Act of 1957, which Abbas described as outdated in the face of developments in Nigeria’s capital market and emerging investment opportunities.
He said the existing law was enacted in a substantially different economic and financial environment, noting that the investment landscape had changed considerably over the past seven decades.
According to him, capital markets have expanded, financial instruments have become more sophisticated, and new opportunities for investment and wealth creation have emerged, making legislative reform necessary.
“The challenge is to strike the right balance between preserving trust assets and enabling reasonable returns on investment. An excessively restrictive framework may deny beneficiaries legitimate opportunities for growth, while an inadequately regulated one may expose their assets to imprudent decisions and avoidable risks,” he said.
Abbas stressed that expanded investment opportunities under the proposed legislation must be accompanied by strong safeguards, clear fiduciary responsibilities, effective risk management and appropriate regulatory oversight.
“Trustees must be guided by prudence, integrity and transparency, while assets held in trust must be managed in the interests of beneficiaries rather than for the personal advantage of trustees.”
The Speaker said a credible framework for managing trust investments could contribute to deeper capital markets and more effective mobilisation of domestic resources to support infrastructure development and economic growth.
He urged stakeholders to pay particular attention to investment categories, diversification requirements, fiduciary obligations, professional delegation and regulatory oversight in considering the bill.
He also called for a coordination in the national real estate regulatory system to tackle property fraud, eliminate institutional overlaps and strengthen investor confidence in Nigeria’s housing market.
“Nigeria does not lack property. Nigeria lacks enough trust in property,” he said.
He identified multiple land ownership claims, fragmented approval processes, unverifiable property titles and inadequate protection for off-plan buyers as major obstacles driving up housing costs and discouraging investment.
He said the framework should accommodate innovations such as electronic conveyancing, digital escrow, automated compliance checks, remote verification and new housing finance models without weakening consumer protection and anti-money laundering requirements.
Abbas also proposed a Unified National Real Estate Enforcement Architecture to connect the activities and records of federal and state regulators, professional bodies and law enforcement agencies.
The Speaker warned that weak property verification systems could also create opportunities for money laundering, corruption and organised financial crimes.
On housing finance, Abbas disclosed that the MOFI Real Estate Investment Fund had deployed N140 billion through 21 financial institutions as of August 2026, creating 2,018 mortgages across 27 states. The mortgages offered repayment periods of up to 20 years at a fixed interest rate of 9.75 per cent.
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