YOUTHS of an Ibadan local community in Oyo State were up in arms against some officials of the state government at the weekend over an attempt to demolish some structures belonging to the community.
But for caution that was applied by some elders of the Beere and Ojaba area, where the incident occurred, some of the structures belonging to the popular Iba-Oluyole family would have been destroyed.
Early morning on Friday, officials from the Ministry of Environment and Habitat with officials of the joint security patrol outfit tagged ‘Operation Burst’, had stormed the area with bulldozers, ready to demolish the structures.
The youths, however, mobilised, confronted the armed government agents and prevented the exercise.
In the melee, touts and miscreants that usually loiter around the area took the advantage to terrorise the people, especially traders who became perplexed, and carted away their goods, food, money and other valuables.
The angry youths carpetted the government for its refusal to honour and respect two court injunctions, dated January 15 and December 20, 2013 granted by Justice Iyabo Oyelaran of a state High Court.
Head of the Iba-Oluyole Family Compound (Mogaji) Nureni Akanbi and other prominent elders of the compound had to intervene and pleaded with the youths not to engage in any act that could threaten the peace of the land or lead to casualties.
Reacting to the incident through a telephone interview, counsel to the family, Niyi Ajewole, described the action of the government as a disgrace to democracy and accused the government of abdicating its responsibility of protecting the people, but rather engaging in terrorising them.
Akanbi, in his reaction, expressed shock at the turn of event as he too said the government action, which led to the destruction of property worth about N5 million, was a violation of a court order which restrained it from tampering with the structures, asking, “where is the respect and regard for the rule of law they claim to hold dear to their heart?
“The land in question belongs to Iba-Oluyole family compound and it extends from Ojaba to the boundary of Ogunmakin community in Ogun State but we were surprised that the government went on with the demolition without any quit notice, not minding that there is a subsisting legal instrument against such government action”.
He recalled that the government expressed readiness to acquire the land in 1971 but, “we, thereafter, got three government approvals to construct shopping complex, the construction of which we started in 2004 after the death of my predecessor, Mogaji Amusa Akanbi, in 2003.
“I became the Mogaji in 2007 and we continued with our developmental projects which were completed and occupied in 2010. We even donated a piece of land to government for the construction of office and public toilet and a transformer was given to us in 2010 but it was not put into use,” the family head disclosed.
Reacting to the incident, Oyo State government, through the Special Adviser to Governor Abiola Ajimobi on Media, Dr. Festus Adedayo, said: “This is a deliberate politicisation of government’s genuine and noble intention to provide markets and stalls for the teeming traders in the state as the dramatis personae of this whole drama are known Peoples Democratic Party stalwarts bent on painting the government in bad light.
“For the benefit of the doubt, even though government had expressed readiness to acquire the said land since 1971 and the present government has shown the intention of constructing hundreds of markets for traders on that axis on the said land, government will continue to persuade the owners to see this as a desire to do good for the greatest number of its citizens.
“Since the markets are meant for the people of the state and not for any individual, government can only plead with politicians seeking political advantage from the construction of the market to let us put the interest of the people first and political party last”.
