Egba people push back against Dapo Abiodun’s urban renewal strategies in Ogun, demand clarity

In an open letter addressed to Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State, Egba stakeholders have raised serious concerns about the ongoing urban renewal projects in the region, accusing the current administration of engaging in land grabbing and neglecting the interests of the Egba people.

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The letter sighted by Freelanews and signed by Prof. Yemi Oke on behalf of several Egba advocacy groups, emphasizes the need for transparency and fairness in the allocation and redevelopment of ancestral lands.

The stakeholders, represented by the Egba Intelligentsia Group, PROYOCO, and Egba’Lokan Agenda 2027, have criticized the administration’s handling of the GRA remodeling project in Ibara GRA, Abeokuta, among other areas.

They argue that these projects disproportionately favour non-Egba mercantilist entities at the expense of the Egba community, which historically owns these lands.

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Prof. Oke, writing as the Bada-Baamofin of Egbaland, stressed that the letter is not a personal attack on Governor Abiodun but a call for accountability and respect for the Egba people’s rights.

He highlighted several key issues that form the basis of their concerns:

1. Public vs. Private Interest: The GRA land, historically communal and taken over for public use, is being sold to private individuals. The stakeholders intend to challenge this legally to determine if such lands should revert to their original owners.
2. Existing Occupants: The letter questions the plans for existing occupants of the land, drawing comparisons to previous administrations that provided suitable replacements before demolishing workers’ residences.
3. Perceived Land Grabbing: The stakeholders are unhappy with the administration’s perceived disdain for Egba interests, pointing out that no Egba individuals hold significant positions in the current administration. They allege that prime lands in Egbaland are being allocated to business entities from other regions.
4. Conflicted Development Model: They argue that the administration’s focus on developing prime lands in Abeokuta, while abandoning infrastructure projects initiated by former Governor Amosun, contradicts its stated intentions and neglects the needs of the Egba people.
5. Reckless Filtering Away of Ancestral Heritage: The stakeholders are particularly incensed by what they see as the reckless disposal of Egba’s ancestral lands to non-Egba individuals, which they consider an insult to their heritage.

In light of these concerns, the stakeholders have instructed their lawyers to seek specific information from the government, including the names and particulars of current and prospective occupants of the GRA land, compensation plans for original landowners, and relocation plans for displaced civil servants.

They have also hinted at potential legal actions to challenge and reverse any questionable land allocations.

The letter concludes with a firm statement of their determination to fight for their rights and heritage, clearly stating their commitment to sustaining these advocacy efforts for future generations.

Read the full letter below:

OPEN LETTER TO:

His Excellency, Prince Dapo Abiodun, CFR
Governor of Ogun State
Governor’s Office, Oke-Mosan,
Abeokuta, Ogun State

Your Excellency, sir

BEFORE “URBAN RENEWAL” TURNS LAND GRABBING IN EGBALAND: A STAKEHOLDERS’ NOTICE OF INTENTION

I write in my personal capacity as the BADA-BAAMOFIN OF EGBALAND, and on behalf of our groups: PROF YEMI OKE OGUN CENTRAL ORGANISATION (‘PROYOCO”), EGBA INTELLIGENTSIA GROUP, and, EGBA’LOKAN AGENDA 2027

Ou groups, “PROYOCO”, “Egba Intelligentsia Group” and “Egba’Lokan Agenda 2027” are bodies of notable, professional and highly successful Egba indigenes at home and abroad. These groups have been engaging with us and other leaders on the GRA remodeling project in Ibara GRA, Abeokuta, opposite the house of the Late Chief Alhaji Fatai Gbemisola (FATGBEMS) and numerous other documented cases of the seemingly reckless filtering of ancestral assets of the Egba people in favour of mercantilists entities and bodies from Iperu, Remo, Ijebu and others over and above the interest of Egbas as ancestral landlords and owners of those assets.

We wish to clarity that this open letter is not, and should never be taken as a personal attack on the person of Prince Dapo Abiodun, CFR. No one should feel or exhibit needless egotistic over-zealousness over and about our rights in respect of our lands as Egba people. We are educated enough, globally exposed, sophisticated and learned enough to know and now begin to vehemently fight for and defend our rights at any and all levels within and outside the country.

This open letter is a stakeholders’ resolve to ask questions, challenge and (if necessary or unsatisfied with any explanations) resist any kind of anti-indigene model of ‘re-development”. For the avoidance of doubt, we are resolved to resist and challenge any form of “Ako’tileta model of “re-development” in the name of urban renewal in Egbaland which trend we have noticed is being exhibited over Egba’s ancestral lands and territories as if no lands exist in Iperu, Remo, Ijebu, Yewa and other parts of Ogun State. We are determined to go the whole hug in proving our points as informed and concerned stakeholders in Egbaland and Ogun State in general. We’re determined to fight and sustain these advocacies now and beyond generations unborn.

BASIS OF OUR POSITION:

(1) Overriding-Public versus Private Interest : One of the lands in question, the GRA land, aside other reckless land-grabbing incidents of certain temporary political office-holders and known strangers in Egbaland, was, historically, a communal land. It was taken-over in the colonial era for “Overriding-Public-Interest. Subsequent administrations have continued to hold the land for public use, for civil servants and other public administrators. We are ready and willing to test the principle of law on whether land taken over for public use can now be sold to private individuals or ought to revert to the original owners of the land.

(2) Existing Occupants : We wish to ask about the existing occupants of the land in question. Assuming, without conceding that the current administration desires to re-develop the choiced, pricy-hectares of land in the GRA; what is the stake or consideration of the existing occupants. Like the Daniel and Amosun administrations that did not demolish workers’ residences until new ones were built and handed over to them as suitable replacements (for example, the Ajebo road, Idi-Aba, Ogun State Housing Estate, OGD Estates in Asero, Oke-Ata, Laderin Worker’s Estate, Amosun’s ‘Degun Estate to mention a few), what alternatives have been put in place under the current administration for the occupants who are now being sought to be desperately evicted.

(3) Perceived Land Grabbing: We have been worried and angry at the penchant of the current administration and its seeming disdain for Egba interests. We are enamored, bitter and unhappy that no Egba son or daughter holds any significant portfolio in the current administration. This administration is known to have abandoned or jettisoned most, if not all, developmental projects in Egbaland. All Amosun’s projects- roads, bridges, hospitals and others are avoided like “leprosy”. The only point of attraction of the current administration seems to be prime lands in Egbaland. At our stakeholders’ meetings, we collectively described these moves as “Land Grabbing- a kind of Akoti’leta model of development that we now wish to resist in Egbaland. While the current administration opted to ignore the hospital project of the Amosun administration, it went just behind the hospital to “develop” two phases of estates on the piece of land left behind OGD’s Judges Quarters and Amosun’s Orange Valley. The same administration is only now interested in re-packaging and accelerating the sale of lands in the Amosun-oriented Buhari Estate. As if that was not enough, it has now “seized” the prime GRA and other vital lands in Egbaland to be allocated to known businesses and mercantilists’ personalities from Remo-Ijebu axis, and other (un)known business and commercial cronies alike.

(4) Conflicted and Convoluted Model of Development : We are worried that those who think Abeokuta has been “overdeveloped” by Former Governor Amosun should ordinarily now be interested in developing abandoned GRAs in Remo, Ijebu and Ilaro axis. The logic of continuing to “grab” choiced lands in Abeokuta for real estate development to benefit “them” and their cronies remains a contradiction of their misplaced “good intentions”. We are proud Egba sons and daughters, if they so remark as usual – We are Egba elites! With, without, during and after the current administration our lands are and remain already blessed by our ancestors and will remain prime lands! Those who abandoned roads, bridges and hospital projects in Abeokuta but would rather focus on prime lands in the same Ogun Central should be advised that the occupants of their real estate investments in those estates will not drive through Remo, Ijebu or Ilaro roads to get to their apartments. They will ply those abandoned roads in Elega, Saje, Kugba, Papa-lanto, Ifo, Odeda-Kila, and others. They may and will need the abandoned Amosun hospital and other vital projects in the State capital that have now been unconscionably abandoned by the current administration.

(5) Reckless Filtering Away of Egba’s Ancestral Heritage: This is, by far, the most annoying trends of the current administration. Egba’s fore-fathers including Lisabi-Agbongbo-Akala should, by now, be angry at us for taking no actions all these while. We’re not “Akotile-tas”. We’ll act and act most desperately, inclusively and decisively. For example, most lands on Abeokuta-Sagamu axis, down to Siun up to Buhari Estate, left and right, are sold and/or bought or about to be sold to mercantilists’ persons of non-Egba origins. This is most insulting to us as if Egba’s business personalities who had existed for decades are now strangers in their lands. At the appropriate time, we’ll also wish to know: Who bought the Government Technical College, Olobe, Idi-Aba, Abeokuta? We’ll seek to know who bought Ogun Radio property on Ayetoro Road, Abeokuta, etc? The way and manner Egba’s ancestral landed assets are being filtered away is demonic, barbaric and despicable. We pray against regular rituals of death burying (ki won ma gbe oku omode wole; gbe ta’gba jade). It’s a “war-like” situation for all of us as Egba sons and daughters. We are determined to fight this battle and win, as usual! It is a battle we must sustain and win now, no matter what it takes.

OUR DEMANDS:

We are stakeholders in Ogun State, and we do not consider ourselves inferior or subservient to any temporary political office holder(s). While we have no objection to the assumed ‘redevelopment” of the GRA and others, we wish to publicly announce the we have instructed our lawyers, MJS Partners, to write a formal letter of demand for certain information in respect of the project and other sundry issues as a prelude to determining whether or not we should take further steps in law to seek injunctive reliefs which we know will span subsequent administrations in Ogun State, up to the Apex Court of the Land (the Supreme Court) to challenge and reverse the sale the GRA and other lands acquired under questionable circumstances in Egbaland for overriding public interest to private individuals and commercial entities.

Given the above backgrounds, we have instructed our lawyers to ask and demand answers to the following questions:

(1) Names and particulars of all existing occupants of the GRA land (and other lands in question) including all authorised civil servants and private persons occupying those lands).

(2) Names and particulars of all applicants and allotees of the redeveloped lands, including their Local Government of origin.

(3) Compensation plans in kind or compensatory land allocation (if any) to the original Egba ancestral owners of the lands, whose lands were initially acquired for overriding public interests but are now being allocated to private persons and commercial entities.

(4) Details of relocation and resettlement plans (if any) of all civil servants and other persons lawfully existing and occupying those lands before eviction notices were served on them.

(5) Such other or further information as may be deemed necessary by our group through ourc Counsel.

Thank you.

Yours faithfully,
For: (1) PROYOCO
(2) EGBA LOKAN AGENDA 21
(3) EGBA INTELLIGENTSIA GROUP

PROF. YEMI OKE, Ph.D, FCTI, FCArb.
(Bada-Baamofin of Egbaland)

Rtn. Victor Ojelabi

Ojelabi, the publisher of Freelanews, is an award winning and professionally trained mass communicator, who writes ruthlessly about pop culture, religion, politics and entertainment.