Mary Akanbi
22nd September, 2025
Sequel to the Premium Times editorial titled “Prioritising National Library Completion, but Not as Charity Project”, published on September 15, 2025, it is important to revisit a crucial paragraph from that piece, which stated:
“This matter transcends charity. National honour, dignity, and history are at stake. It is scandalous that a key institution relocated from Lagos to Abuja as far back as 1995 still operates from a rented building nearly three decades later.”
Those words, written at a time when the National Library was already under the weight of eviction threats, ring louder today than ever before. They serve not merely as commentary but as a mirror reflecting the scale of our national neglect, irresponsibility, and chronic failure to value knowledge.
The National Library of Nigeria (NLN), the apex institution designed to serve as the custodian of Nigeria’s intellectual heritage, is now at the centre of a scandal that would be laughable if it were not so tragic. The library, rather than being a proud symbol of national identity and intellectual advancement, is currently staring eviction in the face over an astonishing ₦447,424,760.91 in unpaid rent.
To understand the depth of this disgrace, one must first appreciate the irony. Nigeria, the self-proclaimed “giant of Africa,” with its endless budgetary allocations, bloated recurrent expenditures, and lavish spending on politics, cannot pay the rent of its National Library. The very institution meant to safeguard the knowledge, memory, and literary heritage of the Nigerian people has now been reduced to the status of a struggling tenant one that dodges landlords, ignores notices, and allows arrears to accumulate to scandalous proportions.
For years, the National Library has been housed in a rented building at Plot 274, Sanusi Dantata House, Central Business District, Abuja. Instead of occupying a permanent home, a national monument worthy of its stature, it has been reduced to squatting in leased premises. That decision alone is a national embarrassment, but the latest developments have dragged the institution into the realm of outright disgrace.
The building was originally owned by Asada Group Ltd, and during their tenure, the company did raise the alarm. They served the library with a demand notice to pay outstanding rent. But even that formal warning was ignored. Rather than address the financial obligations, the library allowed the arrears to swell like an untreated wound. The building was eventually sold to a new landlord, yet the National Library’s tenancy cycle remained unchanged.
In an extraordinary show of goodwill and in what many observers regarded as an effort to spare the nation from international embarrassment; the new landlord went a step further. Instead of moving immediately to eject the library, he signed a fresh two-year lease agreement commencing on 31st March 2025. This gave the institution breathing space, a lifeline, and a chance to redeem itself. But rather than seize the opportunity, the National Library has done the unthinkable, not a single kobo has been paid under this new lease to date.
This is not just negligence, it is reckless disregard. The landlord who tried to shield the Library from humiliation has now been left with no choice but to serve the ultimate instruments of enforcement, a quit notice and a seven-day statutory notice of intention to recover possession.
Let us pause and reflect on this troubling reality. A nation that routinely allocates vast sums to various projects, official functions, and recurrent expenditures has somehow failed to meet a basic obligation: paying the rent of its National Library. The contrast is glaring and forces us to ask a deeper question what does Nigeria truly value: the preservation of knowledge and culture, or short-term spending that yields little lasting impact?
This saga is more than a landlord-tenant quarrel, it is a national indictment. It shows, in raw form, how little priority Nigeria places on intellectual infrastructure.
The Library is not some obscure government agency. It is not a mere office building. It is the apex institution that houses the books, records, archives, and cultural artifacts that preserve Nigeria’s identity. To allow such an institution to become the subject of quit notices and statutory eviction proceedings is to signal to the world that knowledge, education, and culture mean nothing to us.
And this humiliation is only compounded by the ghost of another national disgrace the abandoned National Library building project in Abuja. For decades, that structure has stood as a white elephant, a half-completed carcass of wasted funds and failed promises. Every government has paid lip service to completing it, yet none has taken responsibility. The Premium Times editorial of September 15, 2025 rightly pointed out that completing the project must not be seen as a charitable act, but as a duty. Yet here we are, with the permanent structure still unfinished, and the temporary rented shelter now threatened with padlocks.
So where does this leave Nigeria? From demand notices issued by Asada Group Ltd to the fresh lease of goodwill signed in March 2025, to the statutory quit and possession notices now in play, the National Library has been dragged through the mud like a recalcitrant tenant. Unless urgent intervention comes from the Federal Government, Nigerians may soon wake up to the horrifying spectacle of their National Library locked up like a debtor’s shop in the marketplace. The shame would not be local; it would reverberate across the globe as evidence of a nation that mocks itself.
This is not merely about unpaid rent. It is about priorities. It is about a political class that feasts on public funds while starving the very institutions that could enlighten, empower, and educate the people. It is about the rot in governance that celebrates temporary power but disregards enduring knowledge.
At the end of the day, one painful truth stares us in the face: while politicians gorge themselves on obscene allowances, convoys, and perks, the National Library the vault of Nigeria’s books, records, and cultural treasures faces eviction over unpaid rent, despite the lifeline of a new lease. If this is not a national disgrace, then nothing is.
