Landlords and inhabitants of the Oluwa Palace neighborhood in Lagos State’s Ibeju Lekki Local Government Area have accused hoodlums and police officers from the state’s environment and special offenses enforcement unit of tearing down their homes and leaving them homeless.
According to reports, the police and thugs assaulted the neighborhood with bulldozers and demolished around 50 buildings, including homes, businesses, and other property worth millions of naira.
While bemoaning the invasion, the locals said that they had not received a notice of the destruction and added that those who lost their property had been traumatized by the change.
Olawale Yusuf, a resident of the neighborhood, claimed that his uncle’s property was included in the building that was torn down and that more than N300 million had been spent on it.
He said, “The property has 72 rooms and it belongs to my uncle. We have spent over N300m on it. We still have some property inside and could not bring them out during the demolition.
“We have not been able to bring the property out after the demolition. My uncle is not in good condition right now. We made our verification before building on this land.”
Monday Ajanubor, the owner of a property, claimed that he was ill when the demolition procedure took place and that he was preparing to move into his new home at the time.
He said, “Because my rent was about to expire, I was doing everything possible to ensure that I move into my new house on this land. I sold my cars to put the house in order. Now they called me to say that the house I spent all my life savings on has been demolished.”
Nurudeen Oluwa, the community’s leader, said that his family had received an order of possession from the court as a result of a legal dispute with the state government over the land.
He said, “We took the state government to court in 2009 when it attempted to take over the land. We knew then that there was no way to lawfully challenge the government other than going to court.
“In 2018, the court delivered judgment in our favour, and the judgment was registered at Alausa. Before we moved into the land, they gave us a certificate of warrant of possession. We have been living here since 2018, and members of the family also built their houses here, until the invasion on Thursday.”
Ademola Olowoyeye, the family’s attorney, claimed that Bode Agoro, the Permanent Secretary of the Lagos State Lands Bureau, had thwarted the family’s attempts to take advantage of the court ruling.
He said, “Agoro directed the ministry of physical planning not to accept the registration of building permits, including the making of the fence. Several applications have been lying at the LASBCA office which they refused to treat.
“We wrote to the Attorney General of the state to ensure that the judgment was duly obeyed. He constituted a committee and made Bode Agoro the chairman of the committee. From the first day that we had those meetings, Agoro never betrayed his bias against the Oluwa family.
“When we asked him what he wanted, he said he would give the family 58 hectares out of 300 hectares and we felt that was not right. The last time we held a meeting was November last year, and because of his attitude, my client felt we should sue him and the Attorney General.”
A copy of the court’s decision from January 15, 2018, was made available.
When contacted, the state Commissioner for Information, Gbenga Omotosho, said, “I am not aware of the incident. If you can get me the court order, I will look into it and get back to you”
When contacted, the taskforce’s spokeswoman, Gbadeyan Abdulraheem, stated that the demonstrators’ assertions were untrue.
He said, “We were at Abijo to give an executive back up to the land grabbers’ commission and not to demolish houses. This was contained in our press release.”
