Rather than thaw, the crisis between Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State and the Olubadan of Ibadanland, Oba Saliu Adetunji, over Ajimobi’s installation of 21 monarch-chiefs on Sunday, has deepened.
To stop Ajimobi’s alleged conspiracy to destroy Ibadan chieftaincy law and hierarchical order, about 315 Family Heads (Mogajis) have sued the governor.
Their prayers: Ajimobi should either reverse the promotion of the Baales (village heads) to their new status of Royal Highnesses or await the court’s verdict which, they believe, would bring the government’s reform on Olubadan chieftaincy system into disrepute.
One of the spokesmen of the Mogajis, Chief Wale Oladoja, who heads the Akinsola Family from Labiran Compound, and Chief Abdul Jelili Karimu from Adanla Compound, confirmed the development on Wednesday.
He spoke after the Mogajis held a meeting with the Olubadan in his palace.
Oladoja, a former Director, Odu’a Investment Company Limited, said the Mogajis are solidly behind Olubadan and would seek redress in the court, just as he wondered how Baales, who, by Ibadan customs and tradition, were under them in hierarchy, could be promoted as kings at their (Mogajis) expense.
Oladoja and Karimu declared that the Central Council of Ibadan Indigenes (CCII) which on Tuesday claimed that 90 per cent of Ibadan indigenes back Ajimobi’s chieftaincy review has no capacity to do so, “as the CCII is just an umbrella organisation of socio-cultural clubs and societies where people drink beer and take pepper soup”.
They wondered how, when and where the CCII leadership conducted its survey before arriving at such a ridiculous figure of 90 per cent, when town hall meetings were not conducted.