Landlords and residents of the Oluwa Palace community in Lagos State’s Ibeju Lekki Local Government Area have accused police officers from the Lagos State Environment and Special Offences Enforcement Unit, as well as hoodlums, of demolishing their homes and making them homeless.
The hoodlums, accompanied by police officers, stormed the community with bulldozers, destroying over 50 structures, including houses, shops, and other property worth millions of naira.
While lamenting the invasion, the residents claimed they were not served with a demolition notice, and that those who lost their property had been traumatized as a result of the development.
Olawale Yusuf, a community resident, said his uncle’s property was part of the demolished property, and that over N300m was spent on it.
“The property has 72 rooms, and it belongs to my uncle,” he explained. We spent over N300 million on it. We still have some property inside that we were unable to remove during the demolition.
“We were unable to bring the property back after the demolition.” My uncle is currently in poor health. We did our due diligence before constructing on this property.”
Monday Ajanubor, a property owner, said he was on a sick bed during the demolition, and that he was preparing to move into his new house when the demolition occurred.
“Because my rent was about to expire, I was doing everything I could to ensure that I moved into my new house on this land,” he explained. To get the house in order, I sold my cars. They called to tell me that the house I spent my entire life savings on had been demolished.”
Nurudeen Oluwa, the community’s head, said the court had issued a warrant of possession to his family following a legal squabble over the land between the family and the state government.
“We took the state government to court in 2009 when it attempted to take over the land,” he explained. We knew then that the only way to legally challenge the government was to go to court.
“In 2018, the court ruled in our favor, and the decision was recorded at Alausa.” They gave us a certificate of warrant of possession before we moved in. We’ve been living here since 2018, and family members have built houses here as well, until the invasion on Thursday.”
Ademola Olowoyeye, the family’s lawyer, claimed that the Permanent Secretary of the Lagos State Lands Bureau, Bode Agoro, had thwarted the family’s efforts to reap the benefits of the court order.
“Agoro directed the ministry of physical planning not to accept the registration of building permits, including the construction of the fence,” he stated. Several applications have been left unprocessed at the LASBCA office.
“We wrote to the state Attorney General to ensure that the judgment was followed.” He formed a committee and appointed Bode Agoro as its chairman. Agoro never revealed his bias against the Oluwa family from the first day of our meetings.
“When we asked him what he wanted, he said he’d give the family 58 hectares out of 300 hectares, which we thought was unfair.” The last time we met was in November of last year, and my client felt we should sue him and the Attorney General because of his attitude.”
Punch correspondent was given a copy of the judgment, which was delivered on January 15, 2018.
When contacted, Gbenga Omotosho, the state Commissioner for Information, stated, “I am not aware of the incident.” I’ll look into it and get back to you if you can get me the court order.”
When contacted, Gbadeyan Abdulraheem, the taskforce’s spokesperson, stated that the protesters’ claims were false.
“We were at Abijo to give an executive back up to the land grabbers’ commission, not to demolish houses,” he explained. This information was included in our press release.”
