For soldiers to escort murderous Fulani herdsmen back to a community in Ogun state from which they were earlier evicted and then to publicly whip members of that community for evicting them simply beggars belief.
Have the people of the South West now become slaves in their fathers land? Have we finally been conquered and occupied?
It is utterly mind-blowing. It is wicked. It is evil. It is unacceptable. How much more bloodshed, carnage, violence, insults and humiliation are the people of the South West expected to take? Soldiers are whipping our people like dogs in the street in order to reinstate those that are killing, raping and maiming them?
Is our Army a Nigerian Army or a Fulani Army? Are the Fulanis superior to all others? Are they above the law? Is the Presidency a Nigerian Presidency or a Fulani Presidency? Why do they always speak out in defence of killer herdsmen and never for their victims?
It is only when you have met someone whose whole family has been raped and butchered by Fulani herdsmen that you will know or appreciate what is going on in the South West. It has become a daily occurrence.
They have kidnapped, maimed and slaughtered traditional rulers, businessmen, politicians, elder-statesmen, farmers, artesans, lecturers, teachers, students, artists, pure-water sellers, market women, hairdressers, the rich, the poor, women, children and so many others including the beautiful daughter of Baba Reuben Fasoranti, the leader of Afenifere.
For Miyetti Allah, the ACF, the NEF or anyone else to say that the Fulani “own all the land in Nigeria” and that we are “being provocative”, “beating the drums of war” and “asking for a second civil war” by calling for the arrest and eviction of the killer herdsmen and murderous thugs from our land is insulting and provocative.
Only the ignorant, cowardly and uninformed talk like that. Only those that are secretly behind the carnage, that profit from it and that sent the herdsmen to unleash terror on us can say such things.
The Constitution does not grant the Fulani or anyone else the right to commit murder in Nigeria or to turn the South West into their killing fields. The Constitution does not regard Yoruba blood as being cheaper than others and neither does it prescribe that the Yoruba people are to be treated like sacrificial lambs and killed at will.
Some Yoruba leaders want to be President or Vice President in 2023 and are therefore prepared to keep quiet and tolerate this rubbish that is being done to our people. I am not one of those leaders. Nothing in this world can make me trade in the blood and lives of my people. Nothing will make me turn a blind eye to their sufferings or betray them.
For me my people come first and politics or political expediency comes a distant second. I will speak the truth no matter the consequences, no matter what it costs me and no matter whose ox is gored.
And the truth is that Chief Sunday Igboho, Governor Akeredolu, Afenifere, Professor Akintoye, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, SOKAPU, the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF) and all the other individuals and bodies that have spoken out against the murderous activities of the herdsmen in the South West and elsewhere are right.
And those that have supported or attempted to rationalise the criminal behaviour of the killers in the name of political correctness or political expediency are treacherous, shameless and irresponsible.
If you are a Yoruba man and you want to be President or Vice President I wonder whose affairs will you be presiding over and who will you lead or represent at the national level if all your Yoruba people have already been killed?
Soon we shall start calling the collaborators and coward’s out by name. You betray your own just for support, acceptance and promotion from northerners whereas no northerner worth his salt will ever sell his own people out for you? Nothing could be more reprehensible than that.
Shakespeare wrote ‘cowards die many times before their death’ and Soyinka wrote “the man dies in him who remains silent in the face of tyranny and injustice”. They were both right.
The man has died in too many of our leaders today and the time to speak out is now. We all need to take a cue from Sunday Igboho.
Enough is enough. Too much blood has been shed and too many lives have been taken by these herdsmen in the South West and elsewhere. They kill in the North, the Middle Belt, the South South, the South East and everywhere else and they do it without remorse and with total impunity.
Peace-loving and law-abiding Fulanis are welcome in the South West but those that kill, steal, rape and destroy must leave and they must be brought to justice by the authorities. If this does not happen expect many more Sunday Igbohos to rise up.
The worst culprits in all this are the Buhari administration who are complicit in these crimes and in this ethnic cleansing, mass murder and genocide. I say they are complicit because they have refused to disarm the perpetrators, arrest them or bring them to justice despite the fact that it is their constitutional duty to do so.
They have failed to maintain law and order and to protect the lives and property of the Nigerian people and they continue to pamper and encourage the killer herdsmen.
The Presidency no longer speaks for the Nigerian people but only for Miyetti Allah and the Fulani herdsmen. This is a tragedy of monumental proportions and no matter what they say they will never change.
It was a black Sunday in Ibadan, the Capital of Oyo State, as the youths mourn the death of a leading and emerging youth political figure in the State.
It was gathered that there was a robbery going on in the hotel when Mr Olaleye Ajibola arrived NTC premises, Iyaganku.
He was subsequently shot dead by the robbers. According to an eyewitness, Gatuso was making a call when the robbers sighted him and shot him at close range, probably believing he was calling security agencies.
The eyewitness told our source that guests, members of staff and other people at the hotel lost valuables to the robbery incident.
Oduduwa News has gathered that the National Association of Nigerian Students, the South West (Zone D) under the leadership of Comr. Kappo Olawale Samuel expressed the shock and sadness caused by the crushing to death of students of Adekunle Ajasin University Akungba Akoko, Ondo state.
The coordinator in his statement called it a colossal lost to the students’ community. His full statement reads:
“ONDO ACCIDENT: A COLOSSAL LOST TO THE STUDENTS COMMUNITY
We received with great shock the news of a ghastly accident involving a Dangote trailer which occurred in the evening of Saturday 23rd January, 2021, which claimed the lives of some of our students.
The leadership of NANS Southwest commiserates with the families of the victims, AAUA Community and the Akungba community in general on the sad incident.
The death is really a collosal lost to the students community such that it was a black Saturday for us as an association yesterday.
In this view, we demand that the government through its agency should look into this unfortunate incident and devise all working solutions to prevent a reoccurrence. We can’t afford another loss to death. The safety of our subject worths more than gold to us as an association.
One again, the leadership of NANS Southwest sympathize with the families and friends of the victims and we pray that God grant them fortitude to bear the lost.
May the souls of the victims rest in perfect peace. We love you and will miss you.”
Two of Yorubaland’s most prized states’ helmsmen – Governors Oluwarotimi Akeredolu and Seyi Makinde – have made very strong but seemingly diametrically opposed positions on the security of their people, making it the most talked about issue in the nation today. In recent time, their Ondo and Oyo States have become hotbeds of the scalding hot security crises in Northeastern and Northwestern Nigeria. Flakes of the unending years of savage Boko Haram war in the Northeast are whooshing gently but destructively and settling on Western Nigeria. Fleeing displaced Northerners who escape to the bosom of Oduduwa are stretching Southwest space beyond tolerable level. Infrastructure is becoming unbearably elasticized. Firepower of artilleries is stampeding insurgents from the theater of war and with mounting fire of Northwest banditry, forests of Yorubaland are now comparatively safe havens for fleeing warlords. At the same time, proceeds of kidnapping in Yorubaland are said to be surviving funds renegades of Northeast insurgents and ragtag armies of the bandits of Northwest remit home for the sustenance of their evil war. Unable to withstand the economic weather at home, their neglect by government and the Islamic tzedakahsystem that constituted their survival for centuries, northern beggars and vagrants are also migrating westwards in thousands.
The above alien challenges have successfully defaced the aesthetics and perforated the peace of Yorubaland. The army of beggars in Southwest today will sober even Senegalese-born author and first published Black African Francophone novelist, Aminata Sow Fall of the Beggars’ Strike fame. In Ibadan, for instance, beggars paste themselves like foamy lather round the Mokola overhead bridge, in almost a hundred, while their kindred are scattered round the city in embarrassing proportions. They even have the temerity to sun-dry their tattered clothes on the Ibadan bridge’s metal railings which they have converted into their balustrade. The second evil is the small weevils in the form of ubiquitous young northern bicycle riders, known as Okada, which infest the land like irritant locusts. They are deadly riders who have no respect for traffic rules or law and order. They are responsible for a horde of fatalities on the highway.
One man who should know, Chairman of the Oyo State Security Network Agency, codenamed Amotekun, Col Kunle Togun, (rtd) last week introduced a new dimension to the infestation. Many of the Okada riders, he said, are foreigners and spies for kidnappers and bandits who enter Yorubaland through Nigeria’s porous borders. According to him, ferried into Oyo and other Yoruba States during the COVID-19 lockdown via articulated lorries, most of these Okada riders cannot speak any of the Nigerian languages or English but French and have no known residency permit. Coming on the heels of this invasion is another internal invasion, said Togun. It comes in the form of Yoruba traditional rulers allocating lands to Fulani herdsmen and who, “take money, cows and cars from these people and allow them to settle and wreak havoc in their domains.”
In January, 2018, I had written about the deadliness of Fulani herders. Fulani herdsmen have been declared one of the deadliest terrorist groups in the world by the Global Terrorism Index (GTI). In a survey, GTI said the herdsmen, mainly of the Fula ethnic group, killed 80 people in total in 2013 but by 2014, had murdered at least 1,229 people. The group, according to the report, operates between Nigeria and parts of the Central African Republic (CAR) and had killed 847 people in 2015 across five states in Nigeria through several coordinated attacks during which they inflict varying degrees of attacks on local civilian populations. According to GTI, the attacks were unleashed on private citizens and the Fulani terrorists’ primary and audacious contest is for the farmlands of their victims. These are the people the Nigerian government covers in baby shawl.
President Muhammadu Buhari and a few of his uncritical minded aides have annoyingly sought to legitimize Fulani invasion of Yorubaland and their audacious evils. In September 2018, on the sidelines of the China-Africa Cooperation Summit in Beijing, while addressing Nigerians, Buhari personally lapsed into a variant of his usual incoherent epistle, this time adumbrating why herdsmen terrorism persists in Nigeria. “To my disappointment…the press in Nigeria do not make enough efforts to study the historical antecedents of issues that are creating national problems for us,” the president had waffled, citing what he called “cultural and historical implications” as responsible for the mindless murders and impunity of his brother-Fulani herdsmen.
The last straw that broke the camel’s back was the president’s deployment of callous euphemisms in the service of his waffle. He labeled the Fulani carnage “misunderstanding, especially between herders and farmers” finally heaping the blame of the persistent murders on climate change and the drying up of Lake Chad. This, he claimed, necessitated the frenetic search for pastures by displaced cattle nomads. About the same time, his Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, another Fulani descent, toed same vacuous route of the drying-up of Lake Chad, as well as scarcity of pasture as cause of the Fulani mayhem. At another forum, we were told that renegades of Muammar Gaddafi’s armed men found their ways out of Tripoli to Nigeria with weapons and mutated into the killer herdsmen. At yet another forum, Buhari laid the blame squarely on the doorsteps of ISIS and later, on spiritic opposition members who, in the quest to tar-brush his government, have been funding the mayhem. Buhari’s incoherence has ceased to baffle intelligent listeners.
When it was reported that this self-same Fulani herdsmen had killed Mrs. Funke Olakunrin, daughter of Afenifere leader, Pa Reuben Fasoranti, along the Ondo-Ore road bordered by thick forests, Buhari again deployed his legendary incoherence. Fulani herdsmen were not responsible for her murder. Armed robbers, he said, killed her.
Unarguably, no one in the Buhari government has been as recklessly audacious in hurting victims of herdsmen’s terrorism as Garba Shehu, the President’s media aide. Shehu has constituted himself into the most notorious presidential megaphone renowned for his divisive comments on Nigeria’s interminable insecurity issue. A few hours after Governor Akeredolu articulated the views of the people he governs, announcing that the Ondo forest, which Fulani herders use as umbrella to commit heinous acts of murder and mindless terrorism, would no longer be accessible for their impunity, Garba shot a verbal poisonous arrow at the people of Ondo State, nay Yorubaland.
Clothing his garrulousness in the cloak of law, his statement also rankled with an argumentative pitfall called appeal to the person. Shehu began his fallacy with Akeredolu being “a seasoned lawyer, Senior Advocate of Nigeria and indeed, a former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA)” and that he had “fought crime in his state with passion and commitment,” but, “in our view,” he said, “would be the least expected to unilaterally oust thousands of herders who have lived all their lives in the state on account of the infiltration of the forests by criminals.” Garba’s doggerel also appealed to “rights groups” and “makers of our constitution” who he said would be worried by Akeredolu’s action which he claimed “could set off a chain of events which he foresaw and tried to guard against.” He was apparently borrowing a leaf from his master’s incoherence.
To begin with, that statement was one of the swiftest to come from a presidency that seems in perpetual somnolence. It underscores Fulani issue being at the core of Buhari’s emotions. It came less than 24 hours after Akeredolu’s. As usual, it was a bid to again beatify Fulani herders who are known to be responsible for the spate of kidnappings and murders in the Southwest. But Akeredolu would not allow such hogwash dressed in a presidential bandana. “Shehu’s statement is a brazen display of emotional attachments and it’s very inimical to the corporate existence of Nigeria. We need clearly defined actions on the part of the federal government to decimate the erroneous impression that the inspiration of these criminal elements masquerading as herdsmen is that of power,” he said. He successfully echoed bothers on the streets that the Buhari government provides a nestling comfort and hibernation for Fulani killers and values the lives of his fellow Fulani cows more than Nigerians’.
The Oyo State scenario is both similar and dissimilar to the Ondo imbroglio. One Sunday Igboho, who before now was notorious as leader of a statewide land-grabbing cartel and political violence, had reportedly given a seven-day ultimatum to Fulanis to leave Yorubaland. Following a spate of murders, kidnappings and robberies allegedly perpetrated by Fulani herdsmen in Oyo, Igboho was said to have stormed Igangan, Ibarapa area residence of the Seriki Fulani, Saliu Abdul-Kadri, to tell him that an end had come to the Fulani irritancy.
In a statement issued by Governor Makinde however, he seemed to have sounded like a pacifist in the war to rid Yorubaland of the evil of Fulani herdsmen’s notoriety. While noting that “individuals who are not authorized are going around chasing people from their homes and causing mayhem,” Makinde said that “This assault on residents of Oyo state is not the way to further the Yoruba cause.” And that his administration would not “sit back and watch anyone make any law-abiding resident of Oyo State feel unsafe in their homes, farms, or business places.” Igboho was apparently the referent in Makinde’s innuendo.
Compared to the unusual valour, courage and strength demonstrated by Akeredolu, on the superficial, Makinde sounded like one kowtowing before the Fulani vermin sucking the blood of Yorubaland. However, if you were abreast of some of the issues oscillating in Oyo State, you cannot but act with Makinde’s kind of caution. One is that, but for his latter-day claim to fighting for the people, the name Sunday Igboho was associated with violence, land-grabbing, tyranny and political gangsterism. Hundreds of families who have, over the years, fallen victim of Igboho’s land-related violence would be very circumspect on the real motive of his new-found activism.
I suspect that this de-javu undergirded the governor’s fear on Igboho. Should government accommodate the Igboho irritancy and promote outlaws in urgent thirst of rebranding into undeserved heroism? Which is more desirable in the bid to rout the Fulani criminal elements: embrace the crudity of rogue elements and their lawlessness, resort to their outlandish interventions and by that, justifying the pains and despair they inflicted on the people? In theory, any government which openly goes into an unholy dalliance with the lord of thugs cannot earn the respect of the people of Oyo State.
However, the above operates in the realm of theory. No governor is Chief Security Officer of his state, except in nomenclature. Seizing on the vacuum in security over the years and the known powerlessness of governors to rescue them from their tormentors, Igboho has become a hero among the traumatized people of Oyo State and as such, response to his call to arms is awesome. His heroism seems to have obliterated the long years of his infamy from the minds of the people. Today, Igboho is the David to the rescue of the people from the Fulani Goliath, their own Ogbomoso’s Ogbori Elemoso of the 15th century, and Makinde seems inconsequential in the equation.
So, is Sunday Igboho a reincarnation of Ogunlola? The story of Elemoso cannot be divorced from the Ogbomosho history, its civilisation and conquest. It is the story of Olabanjo Ogunlola Ogundiran, an Ibariba. In 1650, history reported that Ogunlola and his wife named Esuu migrated to current site of Ogbomoso in continuation of his hunting expeditions. They settled beside the Ajagbon tree. With other hunters, Aale, a Nupe descendant; Onisile and Orisatola, they formed the Alongo, a system of administration aimed at securing their settlement against wild animals and enemy invasion. Imprisoned in Oyo-Ile for his oft delve into criminal activities, Ogunlola heard of the notoriety of a wicked and deadly character called Elemoso who was terrorizing Oyo-Ile people. He was believed to be a spirit. Ogunlola then went to the Alaafin to ask for his permission to confront this terror. At the palace, as Ogunlola told the king of his quest, palace courtiers shouted, “Elemoso, eni t’a o ri! Iwo ke! – Elemoso, an invincible man! You?” Grudgingly, Alaafin gave him the go-ahead and Ogunlola stormed Elemoso’s camp and shot him with an arrow, beheaded him and proceeded to the palace with the decapitated Elemoso.
On the surface and judging by his actions since he became governor, Makinde doesn’t seem to harbor any motive to be a Fulani fawner. More than many of his ilk in the PDP, he has fought the Buhari government’s policies most vigorously and has made the federal government look very stupid thereby, subtly underscoring the tissues of issues in true practice of federalism. His stubborn defiance of federal government’s herd mentality of COVID-19 lockdown and school resumption dates are core examples.
That notwithstanding, Makinde and the rest governors of the Southwest would need to flirt after what I call the Akeredolu spirit if they are to be respected by their people. Not doing this will make them to be worthless in the people’s estimation like Muhammadu Buhari and his government. This must however be executed with strict adherence to law and superior logic that the Yoruba are known by, the type that Akeredolu is deploying on Fulanis in Ondo State.
For some weeks now, that irrepressible Ibadan-based broadcaster, Edmund Obilo, has been bringing out the lamentable plights of the people of Igangan in the hands of Fulani herders and drawing out Makinde to confront them headlong. We all know that this won’t happen. With Buhari lionizing the herders in their infamy, no policeman will follow any governor on this suicidal mission.
Yes, I believe that Igboho is very central to this war now. However, he must go through some purgatory, be cleansed of the land-grabbing blood in his hands and return to the fold as leader of the traditional military response to the Fulani menace. There must be genuine repentance and forgiveness for his horde of infractions from thousands of people he inflicted pains upon. The next step would be for Makinde to collaborate with him after his penance to jointly rout the foreign invaders. None of the duo can do it alone. The two, with the support of Amotekun and the science of African metaphysics, should militantly move into the troubled areas of the state where Fulani herdsmen’s vitriol is most burningly dominant and, like Babagana Zulum, working with natives, smoke the blood-sucking deviants back to their land of infamy.
They should both forget their individual political leanings for now, for the sake of the people. This is because, as Bob Marley sang, all the Fulani criminals and their patrons in government desire at this moment for their evil to thrive is for the governor and Igboho “to keep fussing and fighting.” If government militarily descends on Igboho now, he may sprout uncontrollably and become another Muhammed Yusuff, progenitor of Boko Haram insurgency, whose rout by ex-Gov Ali Modu Sheriff and federal government precipitated the colossal havoc today on Nigeria. Igboho will even have the sympathy of the people. I will support him.
Again and very urgently too, Makinde should stampede out those foreigners and their local Fulani accomplices on Okada terrorising the people. He should also rid Mokola Bridge, as well as the streets of Oyo State, of the eyesore of Northern Nigerian beggars who are defacing its environmental aesthetics and highly burnished peace. If Kaduna’s Nasir el-Rufai and Kano’s Ganduje could deport the eyesore of Almajirifrom their states, South West has no business cuddling the menace that the North brought upon itself.
Being firm against the impunity and terrorism of Fulani herders is where the Southwest must begin to externalize what it means by restructuring, a lasecurity. It should then proceed to escalate it further. The ultimate should be a campaign across the region, which must begin now, that only a bastard child of Yorubaland will vote in an unrestructured Nigeria in 2023. By then, Buhari, his Fulani stock and the bastardsamong Yoruba children who have already begun to campaign for positions in an unrestructured 2023 Nigeria, will begin to take Yorubaland seriously. We must stop them in this act of grabbing spoons to swallow their electoral vomit.
As I was putting my submissions to bed, I learnt that the federal government had ordered Igboho’s arrest. Great. It seems thesis and antithesis are about to clash so that we can see a synthesis. Perhaps this will speed up the denouement of this Fulani grisly drama. If a Buhari who has never put any Fulani murderer on trial in his over five years reign suddenly recognises the colour of law and order, then let’s see whether Yoruba will allow this presidential tribal impunity to stand.
How To Achieve Immortality: The Agbato Example
I never had the pleasure of meeting Olatunde Aiyedun Agbato, the Veterinary Doctor and giant farmer whose renown in the Nigerian agricultural sector is said to be a stuff of legends. Agbato died early this month at the age of 71 and was buried last Friday. Aside his wide expanse of agricultural site located in his hometown of Ogere in Ogun State which no passerby on the Lagos/Ibadan expressway can fail to notice, I picked legends about Agbato’s colossus status from two of his mentees, Olumide Origunloye and Adetona Obidele. Both passed through Agbato’s mentorship and regaled anyone who cared to listen with how the University of Ibadan 1975 Veterinary Medicine graduate’s humanity and mentoring have moulded hundreds of leading lights in Nigeria’s agricultural sector.
From a brief stint as an academic in his Ibadan varsity alma mater, Agbato moved into the private sector, establishing the O.A. & O.A. Associates which later transmuted into the Animal Care Services. That agricultural company, with special bias for poultry farming, later grew to become a pantheon and legendary colossus in the livestock products sector in Nigeria as a multi-billion Naira concern. It is impossible to mention three of such legends in Nigeria and skip Agbato’s which is reputed to be one of the hugest private sector employers of veterinarians and allied professionals in Nigeria. His giving back to his Ibadan varsity roots made the university award him the 2017 Alumnus of the Year.
Rather than the business empire he built from the scratch or the wealth he made therefrom, what I found most ennobling about Agbato are the various men and women he moulded, the eulogies of whom caused a huge traffic in the trove of elegies at his departure. It behoves all of us to constantly ruminate on the likely content of the world’s summation of our existence at our departure. Before the ailment which eventually took him away struck, Agbato must have projected a far longer life for himself. This speaks to the brevity of life and the uncertainty of the date and time of its strike.
His investment in humanity was his hugest trophy on earth. His mantra was “the candle doesn’t lose anything by lighting other candles.” He was said to have scant relationship with governments but the private sector. This manifested at his burial on Friday and while alive. Though a numero uno poultry farmer in Nigeria and his huge contributions to agriculture, he was never given any national award in recognition of his contributions. Government also carried this disdain to his burial. The highest government official present at this solemn occasion was the Ogun State Commissioner for Agriculture and Senator Adegboyega Kaka, the latter, Agbato’s colleague.
To uplift the status of his sleepy town of Ogere, he moved his Animal Care company there some years ago. Banks and other commercial ventures, ipso facto, moved to Ogere because of him and his people benefitted immensely from this gesture. It was said that there is no home in Ogere that didn’t have a representative among his staff. Agbato was a shrewd businessman with a can-do spirit of moving the biblical mountains and who didn’t believe anything on earth was impossible. His company was the first to begin producing vaccines for Nigerian poultry and in 1986, when investors were eloping from Nigeria on account of the constricting economy, Agbato stepped in to fill the vacuum by unilaterally producing poultry feeds for Nigerian agricultural sector. He was ahead of his peers by more than one million miles.
Yes, the world has become more plastic and cosmetic than ever before, breeding a hostile world where no one bothers nor is eager to sow into the life of the other person. It is a life reminiscent of habitation in the jungle where survival of the fittest is the rule and eliminating the weakest at random is the unwritten code. Here, the lions, tigers, hyenas and other wilds feast upon the feeble and miserable lots like the impala, antelopes and the likes while the crocodiles of this world even feast on the young crocs of their own species. Let’s learn from Agbato and make our lives to nevertheless be devoted to doing good and nothing more. Since no one who dies has ever returned here to give account of the modus operandi in the hereafter, we should all decorate our existence with bouquets of conscious daily living for humanity. How sure are we that the higher the tone of positive eulogies and garlands at our departure, the more certain we will achieve immortality? If the evocative elegies of his good works on earth are the qualification for a greater higher life, then Sir Agbato is right now in heaven.
To restore peace in Igangan and entire Ibarapaland, the governor of Oyo State, Engr. Seyi Makinde has perfected plan to meet traditional rulers, Inspector General of Police team and other stakeholders to find a lasting solution to herdsmen-indigenes crisis in the State.
The Deputy Chairman, Oyo State Council of Obas, Oba Francis Alao, who said this in an interview with one newsmen on Saturday, said the meeting was organised primarily to ensure that peace returned to the area.
The monarch said a team of the state government would represent the governor while a team from the office of the IGP would stand in for Adamu, noting that the Commissioner of Police in the state, Ngozi Onadeko, would be present at the meeting.
He said, “I am going there tomorrow (today) to hold a meeting with all the traditional rulers in Ibarapaland. The Commissioner of Police in Oyo State too will be there. A team from the Inspector-General of Police Office is also going to be there. The state government (representatives) will also be there.
“All we want to do is to ensure there is peace in the area for everybody to coexist peacefully. I am going in my position as the Deputy Chairman, Oyo State Obas Council; I am going on that premise and we have told all traditional rulers from the three local government areas in Ibarapaland to be there as well.
“There is an ongoing reconciliatory effort at Tede, Ago Are and Ago Amodu in Atisbo Local Government Area. I am coordinating that and everybody should sue for peace. Everybody should eschew violence and embrace peace while the security agents will do their investigation.”
The Asigangan of Igangan, Oba Lasisi Adeoye, also confirmed to our correspondent in Ibadan that he and traditional rulers from Ibarapaland would be part of the meeting,
He said, “All the Obas in Ibarapa will hold a meeting here in Igangan tomorrow (today) and the Olugbon will be here for the meeting.”
Badagry – one of the five traditional divisions of Lagos State – reaped bountiful dividends of the development programmes of the Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration.
A 110-bed Maternal and Childcare Centre (MCC), School of Anaesthesiology in Badagry General Hospital and 252 units of two bedroom housing project in Idale; all completed and delivered in the ancient town by Governor Sanwo-Olu.
On Saturday, the boundary town literally stood still for the formal inauguration of the projects, as residents and traditional rulers, led by the Akran of Badagry, trooped out to receive the Governor, his deputy, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat, and members of their entourage.
Besides, Sanwo-Olu flagged off the construction of the 5.5 kilometre-long Hospital Road being rehabilitated to create easy access to the Badagry General Hospital and the new housing estate in the town.
The Governor said the projects were part of his administration’s efforts to bring development in Badagry at par with other areas of the State. With the completion of the four-floor MCC, which is already being operated, Sanwo-Olu said the State Government had expanded healthcare infrastructure and improved access to quality health services in the town.
“Today’s commissioning activities are in fulfillment of part of the promises we gave our citizens in Badagry and I am delighted to be inaugurating three key projects that will enhance standards of living and boost development of human capital, particularly the 110-bed MCC we have completed in this part of Lagos.
“This is just a testimony to our assurance to the people and our commitment to deliver quality projects that will turn around the lives of our citizens. Not only the MCC we are handing over for public use today has an emergency service, it also caters for obstetrics and gynecology. There are also laboratory, radiology, paediatrics and immunisation departments.”
The Governor said the rehabilitation and expansion of the School of Anaesthesiology in the Badagry General Hospital were aimed at increasing the number of trained professionals in the field. He said such pivotal projects were being replicated in other locations across Lagos.
He said: “The people of Badagry and the adjoining communities now have increased access to quality and safe healthcare, and reduction. This will bring about complete eradication of maternal and infant mortality, as well as general improvement in all maternal and child health indices in this local government. All these benefits will in turn have a positive ripple effect on the development and socio-economic indices of Badagry.”
Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi, said the Badagry MCC was immediately activated for operation after its completion last November, disclosing that the facility had already delivered healthcare services to over 3,000 outpatients and 600 children. The facility, the Commissioner said, has taken 49 successful caesarean deliveries.
The MCC, Prof. Abayomi noted, would complement the capacity of the 21 primary healthcare facilities across the three Local Government Areas (LGAs) in Badagry axis.
Sanwo-Olu said the State Government acknowledged the effect of affordable housing on the socio-economic wellbeing of the residents, which was why his administration went into a joint partnership with a private investor, Echostone Development Nigeria Ltd, to deliver the 252-unit two-bedroom terrace bungalows for low- and middle-income families.
The housing project was designed with eco-technology and EDGE Advanced protocol, which is a green building certification that making buildings to be more resource-efficient.
Sanwo-Olu said same technology would be employed to build the proposed Workers’ Village in Ipaja later in the year. This scheme, he said, will provide 600 affordable housing units to workers and their families.
He said: “The 252 units of two-bedroom terrace bungalows being commissioned today incontrovertibly proved our sincerity about closing the housing deficit and delivering our housing promises through relationship we have cultivated with the private sector for housing development. This Idale-Whedako Scheme is indeed a direct result of our faith in the capacity of the private sector to play a supportive role in housing development.
“This housing scheme has come with the lowest of prices, which makes it affordable to the targeted population. The payment plan will be spread over a longer period of time. I thank our development partner, Echostone Development Nigeria Ltd, for supporting the State Government in this regard.”
Commissioner for Housing, Hon. Moruf Akinderu-Fatai, said the housing project was uniquely designed and came with the convenience of low cost maintenance in terms of water usage and energy efficiency.
He added that the project had security and comfort features, such as streetlights, water treatment plant, central sewage treatment plant, strong perimeter fence and good road network.
“No doubt, the housing scheme has added great environmental and economic value to Badagry community,” Akinderu-Fatai said.
Governor Sanwo-Olu took about 1.17-kilometre road walk with Badagry residents to flag off the reconstruction of the decrepit Hospital Road that connects the city centre to the Badagry General Hospital.
While declaring the project open, the Governor noted that the project would be expanded to double carriageway and will be done in two phases, with the first phase spanning 3.2-kilometres.
The second phase is 2.3 kilometres and it will commence immediately after the completion of the first phase.
Sanwo-Olu said: “This road construction flag off is a demonstration of our readiness to serve our citizens on this part and it doesn’t matter how long it takes. It doesn’t matter how far Badagry is from the State capital; we will never neglect this city in our development drive. We will continue to justify the confidence you reposed in us when you voted us in.”
The Hospital Road also links five communities- Idale, Akarakunmoh, Pivota, Topo and Ajido – to Lagos-Badagry Expressway via Joseph Dosu Road.
A group of cattle breeders in Nigeria, the Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, has said no one has the right to evict herdsmen from the forest reserves in Ondo state because all the land in Nigeria belong to Fulani.
Bello Abdullahi Bodejo, the national president of the association told the Sun newspaper in an interview that herders will not obey Akeredolu’s directive mandating them to vacate the forests reserves. Bello Abdullahi Bodejo has said the order by Governor Akeredolu is illegal. do not need anybody’s permission to use a forest for grazing so far as it provides the nutrients needed by their cattle.
Bodejo said: “All the lands in this country belong to the Fulani, but we don’t have any business to do with land if it doesn’t have areas for grazing; if the land doesn’t have cow food, we won’t have any business with it. We don’t sell land, we don’t farm.
What we consider is the areas that have cow food. If the place is good for grazing, we don’t need anybody’s permission to go there.” He said the group had filed a legal action challenging the legality of the Ondo state governor’s order. Bodejo distanced herdsmen from kidnappings, armed robberies and other violent crimes reportedly being carried out in parts of the country.
“I Walked All Night In The Forest, Now In Ogun State”—Seriki Fulani Says After Youths Sets Ablaze His Abode In Oyo
Following the Friday night unrest in Igangan, Ibarapa North Local Government of Oyo State, the Seriki Fulani of Oyo State, Alhaji Saliu Abdulkadir, on Saturday morning, said he trekked through the forest to Ogun State from Oyo State.
He said that many of his family members were shot by the angry youths. He said none of his family members was killed in the fracas.
Abdulkadir further revealed in Ibadan that he, his wives and children were sent out of the settlement by the youths, adding that 11 vehicles and houses were burnt in the process.
He said despite assurance by the police and the people of the state, his house was burnt in the presence of security agents.
He said, “As we speak, we are in the bush. Our cars, numbering about 11, have been burnt. Some of my children sustained injuries, and we are looking for a way to get them to the hospital. My children have left their houses for the bush. We need the government to help us. Police, Operation Burst and other security agencies were there when they set my house ablaze.”
…We‘ll digitalise educational system in Oyo – Makinde
Governor ‘Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, on Tuesday, said that his administration remains committed to digitalising the educational system in the state with a view to bringing about qualitative education and enhancing teaching and learning.
The governor equally stated that his administration is ready to partner with Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) on quality education service delivery in the state.
A statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the governor, Mr. Taiwo Adisa, indicated that the governor stated this while receiving a delegation of the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), and the Universal Basic Education Commission led by the KOICA Country Director, Mr. Woochan Chang, at the Courtesy Room of the Governor’s Office, Secretariat, Ibadan.
The statement added that the KOICA delegation was in Ibadan to inspect on-going construction works on a Smart (Model) School Project being constructed by UBEC in Sogunro Village, along Moniya-Oyo Road, Akinyele Local Government Area.
While welcoming the delegation, Governor Makinde explained that as part of his administration’s determination to improve the standard of education in the state, his government has budgeted 21 to 22 per cent for education in the 2021 budget.
The governor said: “We have 21 to 22 per cent for education in our budget and it is unprecedented.”
He added: “I personally take special interest in the smart school project. I went to the project site and we will ensure that the quality meets international standards. I am glad that you are looking at interventions in ICT because e-governance is something we have also been looking at.
“With the pandemic, the challenges for us to take knowledge to our students became really compounded. So, what we have done in Oyo State, even at this secretariat, is to move towards e-governance. We have laid fiber-optic cables all around. We have bought computers and we are in the process of ensuring that our processes are moved towards e-governance where we are not going to be carrying files all over the place.
“We are doing the same thing at the primary and secondary school levels. We will prepare people for e-governance. The importance of moving everybody – both the students and teachers – to have appreciation of ICT became really hectic.
“You have our commitment as we have the SSG and Chairman of SUBEB to take you to our ICT Centre here. Before we came in, it was just a dream in the pipeline but we are now executing.”
The governor, who maintained that the on-going construction work on the Smart (Model) School project in Ibadan will be ready for commissioning in the next 8-10 weeks, said his administration has always put its money where its mouth is.
“In terms of putting our mouth where our money is, the budget performance for last year, close to 60 per cent is a clear departure from the past where budget performance was always around 35 or 36 per cent.
“I believe that this particular model school will start soon and we will be monitoring them. Like the chairman of SUBEB said, hopefully in the next 8-10 weeks, we should have the project ready for your intervention.
“This is me having the responsibility to ensure that our programmes for the improvement of education in the state are executed. I am here with you this morning, which is to demonstrate enough commitment at the highest level in paying attention to one of the major pillars for us.
“Again, for me personally, I am not an elite as I did not come from the Upper Class. I came from the lower-middle class and the only thing that brought me to the table was the fact that I got educated.
“So, you can rest assured that if you need to see me, it will be arranged quickly and we will do everything within our power as a government to ensure our students get the best in terms of education,” the governor said.
The governor added that his administration would like to collaborate with the South Korean government in the area of vocational and technical education in the state.
He said: “Quite frankly, we will love to have intervention programmes in our vocational and technical education as well, because we have a lot of our graduates either riding Okada or roaming the streets.
“Yes, they get a formal education but there is still a gap in terms of responsibility, and how they can easily just roll into the economy and make their contributions.
“I know that South Korea has been at the fore-front of technology. So, soft areas such as vocational and technical will be a good curriculum for us. These are areas that if we have partners willing and able to support us, we will demonstrate the seriousness that is required.
“In anything that you are doing with us, please feel free to carry out an audit to come back and see the sustainability of some of the things that you will do with us. You can rest assured, we will do everything within our power to give back confidence and to have that openness such that you also will be assured that your money is not being wasted.”
Earlier, the Country Director of KOICA CA), Mr. Chang, said that the agency is partnering with UBEC on the provision of multimedia equipment and facilities to the model school.
He said: “We are here on assessment. We’ve met the governor, SUBEB chairman and other education officials in the state. We are here for an on-the-site visit to the school construction area. We need to see how much the government and SUBEB are eager to utilise the investment for the future education in the state.
“We are representing the South Korea Government. We have supported many countries in the world. KOICA is supporting many countries in social and economic development. Basically, we promote digital performance and digital education in Nigeria. On the other hand, we have an interest in promoting ICT, digital education in Nigeria.”
The Inspector General of Police has ordered Oyo State Commissioner of Police to arrest Sunday Igboho and bring him to Abuja.
Confirming the order, Presidential spokesman, Garba Sheu told newsmen in Abuja on Friday.
Shehu reportedly said the IGP informed him of his directive to Ngozi Onadeko, the Oyo commissioner of police, to arrest Igboho and transfer him to Abuja.
Frank Mba, police spokesman, did not immediately respond to newsmen inquiry on the order of the IGP.
Igboho had asked herdsmen in Igangan in Ibarapa north local government area of Oyo to leave within seven days following reports of the killing of some Oyo citizens.
He had blamed herders and Fulanis, including Saliu Kadri, the Seriki Fulani, of being behind the rising insecurity in the area.
The quit notice generated tension in parts of the state, prompting Seyi Makinde, the governor, to ask the IGP to arrest those fomenting trouble under the guise of protecting the interest of Yoruba people.
“For people stoking ethnic tension, they are criminals and once you get them, they should be arrested and treated like common criminals,” the governor had told the police commissioner.
