Since 2001 when it launched its operations in country, the British American Tobacco Nigeria (BATN) has not shied away from controversies. Now, a veteran publisher is accusing the company of massive land grab in Iseyin, Oyo State. Assistant Editor Seun Akioye reports
It may have served as his retirement get-away plan. After many decades in publishing educational books and teaching many generations of Nigerians, Jonathan Olusanya Onibonoje, came up with the most novel idea yet. In collaboration with Chief Mrs. QVN Babalola, he bought a large parcel of land measuring about 25,000 acres on Adoawaye-Okeho-Iseyin Road, Iseyin Local Government Area of Oyo State. A new company, Q-JON Farms was born. That was way back in 1987.
“The purpose of the land is to create a farming industrial estate,” Onibonoje told The Nation.
“We had good intentions and we wanted to create employment for the people of Iseyin. There would be different industries there, dairy farms too,” he said.
It was a tall dream and Onibonoje and his partner wasted no time in putting the plan to work. The same year, the survey of the land was done and on January 11, 1988, the Certificate of Occupancy (CofO) was granted to the farm with registered number: KARA/OY/1095/87 and registered as number 39 page 38, Volume 2796.
“We planted cash crops and trees; there were mango trees and melina, we had food crops too. It was a massive investment and a very ambitious project. But we also needed foreign partners because of the industries that we planned to have which would produce juice and other drinks from the various fruit-bearing trees on the farm,” Wale Olakojo, who was the General Manager of the farm said.
A shattered dream
After managing the farm for about six years, Q JON farms began serious partnership talks with a couple of foreign investors. “ We were bringing Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to the country, our plan was that with the successful kick-off of all the functional sections of Q-JON farms, there would be hundreds of employment for people in the community and beyond,” Gloria Onyeukwu , a director in the company said in 1993.
But the company’s expansion programme could not have come at a worse time as political events of the era under the leadership of the late Head of State, Gen. Sani Abacha, ensured that the foreign investors who had already arrived in the country left in a hurry. The partnership programme was left on a life support.
“Things slowed down a bit after that. The political situation was unfavourable to any investment. So, we allowed the local people to cultivate part of the land for farming because the company’s passion was to do something for the people of Iseyin. We felt it was a way of empowering them, though not on the large scale that we would have loved but it would help some families,” Gloria said.
If the management of the farm had been disappointed at the inability to secure foreign partnership, they were unprepared for more heartbreak.
Olakojo said: “In 2011, we noticed that our signboards were taken down and signboards of a tobacco company, British American Tobacco (BAT) had been put up around a section of our farm. We also noticed that the company has destroyed a large part of our farmland.
“We went there to try and find out what was going on, but BAT totally ignored us. I went there more than 10 times trying to get a hint of what was going on, but the company began to threaten us,” Olakojo said.
The land which has been allegedly encroached measured a little over 1000 acres. It is an expanse of land which the management of Q-JON farms was not willing to give away.
According to Olakojo, the encroachment was discovered when he took some interested foreign partners to the farm. “We look like 419s when the partners saw the signs of BAT,” Olakojo said.
According to Q-JON, when every effort to get a “reasonable” solution to the problem failed, the management approached its solicitors, Royal Solicitors to write to the BAT.
The first letter to BAT was written on August 15, 2011 and signed by Udo Ofurunna. The letter titled: “Notice to stop further encroachment unto the 25000 acres of land situate at Iseyin, Oyo state, property of Q-JON farms Ltd”, warned BAT that if further encroachment is not halted on the aforementioned land, court action will be instituted against the company. It ended with a caution: “A stitch in time saves nine.”
According to sources, the letter and subsequent warnings meant nothing to the tobacco merchants. And to Olakojo and Gloria, BAT behaved irresponsibly by claiming ignorance of the core issue in the letter.
Persistence on the part of the land owners finally brought the BAT management to the table, but on BAT’s own terms.
“When I was eventually able to get BAT’s attention, its management began to make series of demands like asking for a letter from Daddy (Onibonoje) to confirm that I have the power to act for the farm. They requested for the life size survey plan of the land, requested that I come to physically show them our land, they were literarilly asking me to come almost every week,” Olakojo said.
The matter dragged from 2011 to 2015 with BAT claiming to be the rightful owner of the land. The company alleged that the land had been leased to it by a family in Iseyin since 1990.
“The question to ask is whether BAT was in Nigeria in 1990, because we know they came into the country in 1990,” Gloria claimed.
She also accused the company of being manipulative. “They wanted to wear us out, they didn’t consider the age of the owners of the farm, they were just manipulating them.”
In August, what could best be described as a silver lining appeared in the horizon when BAT asked for a peace meeting between the parties.
“We went to the meeting with our lawyer in their office in Ibadan. They subjected us to a most humiliating search before entrance. And when we asked them to bring their documents to the land, they claimed it was in the archives, they never showed any documents,” Gloria claimed.
Things went from bad to worse since then. All the 42 signs erected by Q-JON were removed almost immediately by BAT officials, who carted them away. It claimed most of the Melina trees were cut by BAT to cure tobacco leaves and the company used the remaining trees as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) claiming it was practicing reforestation.
The farm also alleged that BAT later changed its position on the ownership of the land, saying it rented it. The company claimed its agent was arrested and humiliated by the police on the orders of BAT.
“They called for a second meeting and they did not bring any documents to their ownership of the land. The company was constructing road on the farm, reported us to the police that we were trespassers on our own land. They even dared us to go to court,” Gloria said.
Q-JON accused BAT of playing the game of manipulation in order to frustrate them out of their land. The situation left them with no choice than to institute a court action against BAT.
In the suit number 1/737/15 filed in Oyo state High Court, between Q-JON farm and Chief Mrs. QVN Babalola against BAT, the plaintiffs are asking for a total claim of N935,000,000.
The farm listed: Cassava plantation valued at N5 million; maize plantation valued at N2 million; 200 mango trees worth N20 million, 600,000 Melina trees as some of the economic trees destroyed on the 963.904 acres of land. Each tree was valued at N1000.
The BAT also allegedly destroyed 16 pillars valued at N200, 000 and 12 signboards at N108, 000.
When The Nation went to Iseyin on investigation, BAT had installed no fewer than 10 signboards, claiming the expanse of land as its own. It was also learnt that at least three other families have their lands encroached on by BAT in the Iseyin axis.
In its reaction through the Head, Corporate Affairs, Seyi Ashade, BAT told The Nation that the land belonged to the tobacco giants.
He said: “British American Tobacco Nigeria has constantly advocated for the conservation of the environment. The lands being contested by Q-JON farms are afforestation sites, which have Melina trees grown on 710 hectares of land as a demonstration of our support to the protection of the environment.
“We have been in lawful and undisturbed possession of this land for more than 20 years having obtained title from the original owners of the land including writing a petition to the Nigerian police. Q-JON had been approached repeatedly for settlement on the alleged dispute in a civil manner, as we have evidence of ownership which can be made available on request.
“Instead, different underhanded ways, like blackmail, arrests of our tobacco out-growers and others not to be mentioned have been explored by them.
“As a law abiding corporate organisation, we put the true facts through to the police and our lawyers have been briefed on this persistent harassment over our lawful property. We would have thought if Q-JON had a valid claim to this land it would have approached the court to exert its alleged rights rather than resorting to the police who have no jurisdiction in such land matters and now also trying to settle a civil matter in the newspapers.”
Ashade also said his firm expected the farm to conduct itself in a lawful manner as the land belongs to it by right.
A tradition of controversy
BAT has been in and out of controversy since it signed a $150 million Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Federal Government to establish a tobacco industry in the country.
It was once accused by Anti-tobacco campaigners of preventing a bill on tobacco control which was eventually signed into law by former President Goodluck Jonathan.
The company, which had been accused of directly targeting the youth through tobacco advertising by promoting what has been tagged: “secret smoking parties”, was also berated for pauparising tobacco farmers and using child slaves on their farms in Iseyin.
Perhaps the most recently accusation hauled at BAT was an allegation that it has been bribing government officials in East African countries, to frustrate the passage of tobacco control laws.
The battle line seemed to have been drawn between BAT and Q-JON farms as no fewer than 12 states have gone to court in lawsuits against BAT
