This is really really bad, it breaks my heart to see Nigeria insulted.
Written by By Alex Preston for BBC News
When one of Nigeria's long line of military rulers, General Olusegun Obasanjo, seized the land on which Abuja was to be built in the late 1970s, he could hardly have imagined that the city would remain unfinished 35 years on.
Abuja has a makeshift, haphazard feel to it: A place of bureaucrats and building sites, its streets eerily empty after the buzz of Lagos or the enterprising bustle of Kano.
It is one of the most expensive cities in Africa, and one of the most charmless.
The skyline is dominated by the space-rocket spires of the National Christian Centre and the golden dome of the National Mosque, facing each other pugnaciously across a busy highway at the city's centre.
Its other striking landmark is the vast construction site of the Millennium Tower, which, if it is ever completed, will be Nigeria's tallest building.
The skyscraper was intended to mark Abuja's 20th birthday in 2011. Now delayed until who-knows-when, hugely over-budget and the subject of numerous official investigations.
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