Tunji Wusu –
Ondo State Government denied selling a cocoa plantation and evicting farmers from their farmlands in Ilua Community, Ondo West Local Government Area, on Monday.
Farmers in the village protested on Saturday, alleging that the government had sold their cocoa plantations and other farmlands to foreign firms.
Farmers protested in large numbers, holding posters that said, ‘This is another enslavement,’ and ‘We say no to the devastation of our cocoa estates,’ ‘We don’t want to steal, farming is our work,’ ‘Aketi should not sell our lands to Chinese,’ ‘They should leave us here to farm, we have nowhere else to go,’ and so on.
They claimed that the 20 communities in the vicinity had received a quit notice from the state government ordering all of the farmers to leave their farms. Additionally, the demonstrators said that government representatives had already threatened to forcibly remove them if they did not find a new home by the end of the year.
Oba Olalani Ibidapo, the traditional head of the Ilua Community, claimed some residents had gone to their villages and begun erecting signs claiming the state government had sold their farms and villages to Chinese and Indian businesses.
He remarked, “They claimed the government had issued a notice requesting that we vacate our fields and villages because the firms intended to settle there and take over our farms and communities.
“We have lived here for more than a century, and we only do farming. Ilua, Laoso, Adejori, Logunofe, Keseomi, Obadore, Obakele, Ilua 2, Kangidi, Oloruntedo, Abayemisi, and Magbaralewon are just a handful of the more than 19 communities I have under my control here.
“We received unexpected word that we needed to leave. Where are we heading? Look at our people—they are idle. Although there are graduates here, they have chosen to go into farming because there are no jobs available. We are opposing this policy and pleading with our governor, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, to take our condition into consideration.
Akinbami Philip, the chairman of the youth group for the Laje community in Ondo West’s Laoso District, also made an appeal to the government to reverse the policy and order in his comment.
“Here, we have graduates who own farms, and we want the government to go away so we can work on our farms more.” We provide food for our families here. We complied with the government’s request to pay taxes. The government provided us payment advise every year, sometimes for N3 million, and we followed it.
Akin Olotu, the senior special assistant to the governor for agriculture and agribusiness, asserted that the government was not evicting residents of the state, particularly those living in free zones. He claimed that no rational administration would evict anyone from a free region.
“We want to look into the matter, I will invite their representatives, we will sit down together and look at a win-win situation and see how we can accommodate their interests in what we are doing,” Olotu said in a statement.
“Government is all about the people.” So we’ll know what to do once we see what’s on the ground. Our inquiry reveals that they are even further away from where those employees are expected to arrive for work.
“Perhaps it’s anticipatory action, then.” We will send government surveyors there to determine the precise site. If anyone is affected, we will investigate whether it is a government reserve because nobody came to us in the office, which I believe should be the first thing to do.”
