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Tag: land tussle

  • Eight feared dead in Niger communal land tussle

    Eight Persons were confirmed dead in a communal land tussle between two communities in Lavun Local Government Area of Niger State.

    The communities, Gaba and Anfani were said to have been in dispute over a parcel of land given to Anfani community by Gaba community decades ago.

    The dispute resulted into a bloody clash when a Bida High Court ruled in favour of the Gaba community last week,  directing the Anfani community to vacate the land.

    Having won the court case, Gaba directed 11 of its men to the disputed land to carryout survey but they were waylaid by the Anfani people who killed eight out of the eleven men sent which resulted to a full blown clash.

    Read also: Wike’s govt owes 2,000 Rivers pensioners over N70b –NUP

    Some of the deceased were said to have been beheaded, another had his two feet cut off while scores of people sustained varying degrees of injury.

    The police  yesterday  confirmed they evacuated eight corpses from the troubled area and deposited them at the Bida General Hospital mortuary.

    The Police Public Relations Officer,  Muhammad Abubakar said armed operatives have been sent to the affected areas to restore normalcy adding that no arrest was made regarding the clash.

  • Land tussle: Court restores over 100 buildings to Ibadan residents

    Several house owners and residents of Ekerin layout, New Garage/Akala expressway, in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, burst into celebration yesterday as an Oyo High Court ordered immediate restoration of over 100 houses, churches, schools and business centres forcefully taken from them and locked by people claiming ownership of the land.

    The home owners and their tenants had fled the area for fear of being attacked by gun-wielding intruders, who are believed to be land grabbers.

    The latter took over the property, claiming an October 31, 2018 court order authorized them to take possession of the land as rightful owners.

    Mostly affected by the takeover, were pupils of a private school, George and Duke, BJ foods, ADETS Oil filling station, Jaypee Lounge, Rhema Church, Fit Price Restaurant, Mahendra Drilling, DSTV office, JFK Inn and over 100 residential buildings.

    The residents, whose houses were sealed by the defendants based on the execution of the court judgement, filed applications to set aside the execution.

    The victims stormed the court in the early hours of yesterday, to witness the ruling on the case.

    Read also: Court remands fake Army officer in Ilorin

    In his ruling, Justice O. M. Olagunju ordered that all the affected buildings be unsealed immediately to allow fleeing residents regain their property.

    He declared, that, there was no counter claim in the action filed by the plaintiffs against the defendants, stressing that the dismissal of the plaintiff’s case did not, therefore, confer any right on the defendants.

    A counsel to one of the residents, Toyese Owoade of Emmanuel Afe Babalola chambers, explained that, ”a court of Justice is expected to dispense justice to all citizens regardless of his or her status in the society and that’s why it is generally said that where there is a wrong, there is a remedy. The judgement of the court as rightly noted by the court did not confer any right on the defendants who levied execution.”

    Owoade added that, “It is trite law, that, in such circumstance, where there is no positive order of court granting possession, a party has no right to apply for warrant for possession.”

    Defendants’ counsel, Bolarinwa Lawal, was not available for comment.

  • Ambode, Owoseni urged to intervene in land tussle

    Ambode, Owoseni urged to intervene in land tussle

    The chiefs, indigenes and residents of Orile Fowoseje in Ibeju Lekki Local Government of Lagos State have appealed to Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to save them from land grabbers.

    They urged Police Commissioner Fatai Owoseni to prevent their land from being snatched by hoodlums.

    Spokesman for the community Chief Najimdeen Fatai Ojomu, at a news conference in Lagos at the weekend, said    Orile Fowoseje belonged to Ojomu Royal Family, adding that it had been in existence for centuries.

    He said: “We have been selling land to residents since 1997. They bought the land with the government gazette.

    “We were shocked when land grabbers invaded our community. They were armed and they killed and injured people because they wanted to snatch our land.

    “We are the owners of Orile Fowoseje. The land belongs to us by inheritance because our ancestors occupied it centuries ago.

    “We implore Governor Ambode and Police Commissioner Owoseni to save us from land grabbers. We don’t want to take the law into our hands as law-abiding people. This is why we are urging the government to intervene.”

    The Chairman of Orile Fowoseje Community, Mr. Ajenifuja Adebomi Victor, also implored Governor Ambode and Police Commissioner Owoseni to curb the excesses of the land grabbers “before the situation gets out of hand.”

    Said he: “We have been pushed to the wall. Our patience has been exhausted. We beg our amiable and hard working governor, Akinwunmi Ambode, to rescue us from land grabbers. We also appeal to Police Commissioner Fatai Owoseni to save us from these hoodlums who have been terrorising us. Enough of these killings and maiming.”

  • Family seeks Ambode’s intervention in land tussle

    Family seeks Ambode’s intervention in land tussle

    The family of Adogun-Oluge of Ojomu Ruling House of Olugborogan Olusesi Town in Eti-Osa Local Government Area of Lagos has asked Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to come to its aid.

    It claimed that a traditional ruler is threatening its members’ lives.

    At a press conference in Ikeja, the family’s spokesman, Prince Abolore Olusesi, alleged that the monarch has been using thugs to invade its land measuring 341.24 hectares and covered by Survey Plan no CSR/LA 78/10 dated February 18, 1978.

    In a January 30 petition to the governor, Olusesi, who said his family had just returned from a nine-year self-imposed exile for fear of the monarch, alleged that he was having fresh plans against him.

    He said between last May 26 and October 3, the monarch used thugs to invade the family land and threatened to erase their lineage as a ruling house in that community.

    “On December 29, 2016, the king with some of his thugs came to the community at Olugborogan, threatening and shouting that if he caught me, I will be killed and that my family house in the community will be a thing of the past by pulling it down”, he claimed.

    Olusesi, who claimed that he is the monarch’s major target, said he had been sleeping in people’s place to escape being killed by thugs.

     “I reside in the community but decided to vacate the area in the interim because of the king. Strange vehicles do follow my car along Lekki/Epe express road each time I go to the community. Many community members do come to inform me of the plans by the king to kill me”, he alleged.

    Olusesi alleged that the monarch has persisted in his nefarious acts because past administrations did not act on the petitions against him.

    He urged Ambode to set up a panel to investigate the monarch’s activities.

    Contacted on his phone, the monarch who earlier referred to the petitioner as “bad boy” also said he is not known to him when he was pressed for an appointment to clear the allegations raised in the petition against him.

  • Ex-NTA chief alleges threat to life over land tussle

    Ex-NTA chief alleges threat to life over land tussle

    For 19 years, former Controller of News at the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) Prince Woboroma has been waiting for justice on a land case at the Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal. While the case was pending, part of the land was allegedly sold to a former senator. Woboroma is alleging threat to his life. Is there more to the delay than meets the eyes? JOSEPH JIBUEZE reports.

    When two lower courts gave favourable verdicts in his favour, former Controller of News at the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) Prince Woboroma, did not imagine that an appeal on the verdicts would spend over two decades at the Court of Appeal.

    Woboroma, who is now on the run for his dear life, has accused the Court of Appeal justices of complicity in the plundering of his $12 million worth of assets.

    According him, 200 plots of prime land belonging to him have been decimated, with part of it allegedly sold to a senator from Bayelsa State.

    While fighting to save his assets from being completely plundered, three gangs of hired assassins went after him, and for nearly 19 years, he and his family have been living in hiding without sustenance, his children without access to healthcare and education.

    His case got worse when his lawyer allegedly defrauded and threatened him. The height of it was when Woboroma had a close shave with death as his assailants left him for dead with matchete cuts.

    The 19-year-old land case pending at the Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal is over 200 plots of prime land located on both sides of the road between Ngbuoba Rumuokwuta and Rumuwike, which Woboroma and his four elder brothers, inherited from their father.

    In 1993, following a disagreement with one of his brothers, Chinyerengozi, a Customary Court ruled that Woboroma and his siblings were entitled to inherit their late father’s land, noting that grand children could not jointly share it with their fathers.

    After inspecting one of the land containing 36 plots, the court shared it among the brothers – Chinyerengozi, Woboromazim, Thomas, Igwechi and Prince, all of whom got seven plots each. The remaining one plot was allocated to Chinyerengozi as a matter of privilege.

    Dissatisfied with the Customary Court’s verdict, Chinyerengozi appealed to the High Court, challenging the Customary Court’s verdict. On March 29, 1996, the High Court appeal panel dismissed the case.

    In 1997, Chinyerengozi further appealed to the Court of Appeal, but the case was struck out on November 27, 2012. The appellant, according to Woboroma, did not apply for a relisting of the case within 90 days.

    Three years later, following Chinyerengozi’s death in 2014, the appellant’s children last February applied to re-list the case and their request was granted.

    Woboroma said the case suffered seven adjournments last year without hearing, during which some of the land in dispute was allegedly sold.

    “Questions are being asked everywhere as to why an elite court should keep an incompetent appeal pending for upward of 19 years without hearing,” he said.

    When the case up for hearing last May 11, the appellate court directed parties to explore out-of-court settlement.

    Woboroma’s lawyer E. J. Amiofori, in a petition to the Court of Appeal’s Deputy Chief Registrar in Port Harcourt, wrote: “While we were working out modalities for the first meeting, the appellants took the interim as an advantage to sell the land the res in this suit so as to render the proceedings in this suit meaningless.”

    The lawyer urged the appeal court to intervene to prevent the appellants from selling off the rest of the land.

    Woboroma, in a petition to the Amnesty International, said: “It cannot be overemphasised that the action of the applicants and their lawyer in bulldozing and clearing the land at Okporo after the Appeal Court ordered a settlement constitutes a flagrant disrespect to the Appeal Court itself and the judgments of the two lower courts. It’s also a sign of repugnance to the court’s order for settlement.”

    According to him, 95 per cent of three parcel of land with over 190 plots “has been decimated and dissipated …”, with only 16 plots left.

    He expressed worry that the appellate court did nothing to preserve the land over which an appeal was pending.

    Woboroma, in his petition to the Amnesty International, believes that the Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal “unlawfully stifled the ‘lucrative’ appeal” by keeping it in abeyance for years.

    He said the attempt to eliminate him was in a bid to cover up the injustice being meted to him by those he accused of “illicit participation in the unlawful sharing of his heritage.”

    “In the wake of their relentless pursuit, we fled the region, and have been living in hiding for about two decades. My family is in dire straits, without sustenance and means,” he cried.

    Woboroma wondered why the case would drag for 19 years on appeal if the justices did not have vested interest. He said following threats to his life and those of his children, he had to relocate for fear of being killed.

    “On one occasion, I was abducted at the gates of the Port Harcourt High Court and ‘summarily executed’ and left for dead on the outskirts of the city. In the wake of all this threat, I fled my hometown and state. My family and I have become refugees in our own country,” he said.

    Woboroma also accused the police of partisanship, saying his cries for help and protection were not heeded.

    “Government agencies are now allowing themselves to be used by criminals to do their dirty jobs for them for the sake of money. I have never heard of a matter under trial in court being sublet to the police for adjudication until this happened in 2012. That is the degree of corruption in the service and in all fabrics of the Nigerian society,” he said.

     

    Bid to frame him up

     

    Woboroma said a criminal charge was filed against those who allegedly trespassed his land in 2012. He said the case was subsequently bungled by the magistrate and the police.

    Instead, he said there was a bid to frame him over his claim that he was “attached” to the NTA. He was accused of impersonation for claiming to be an NTA staff after retirement. But, Woboroma said what he meant when he stated that he was “attached” to NTA was that he was working for NTA as a consultant.

    To make matters worse, NTA responded to police enquiry by saying that Woboroma “was not a staff”. He was subsequently arrested, detained until he was granted bail after paying N2 million.

    “That was the outcome of NTA’s collaboration with the criminal gang, the police and a chief magistrate. It took the intervention of the Inspector-General of Police who withdrew the matter from Port Harcourt,” he said.

    It took another letter by Woboroma’s lawyer for NTA to clarify issues. “Prince Woboroma was a staff of the NTA from 1975 to 1995 when he retired from the services of the authority. Recently, he is in consultation with the programmes/marketing to produce about three programmes for the authority,” NTA wrote in November 2013.

    Woboroma urged the government to protect his family and ensure that justice is done and his property retrieved. He wants all permanent structures built on the land built illegally on the land to be demolished.

    “In view of the Appeal Court’s demonstrable inability to hear the appeal for almost two decades, the lower courts’ subsisting judgments should be quickly upheld and the original court authorised to proceed to enforce and implement their decisions on the mode of sharing my late father’s estate to only his five descendants at the time of the ruling in 1993.

    “This will enable those grandchildren whose fathers have died to legally inherit what belonged to their biological fathers,” he said.

    In 2014, the law firm of Falana & Falana petitioned the Commissioner of Police in Rivers to seek police protection for Woboroma.

    “We urge you to use your good offices to grant our client police protection anytime he is in Port Harcourt to safeguard and preserve his life from the persons complained about and their cohorts,” the firm wrote.

  • Families’ land tussle shifts to Appeal Court

    Families’ land tussle shifts to Appeal Court

    A parcel of land measuring 117.188 hectares in Itele-Aiyetoro, Ado-Odo/Ota Local Government Area of Ogun State was given last October to a family, courtesy of an Ijebu-Ode High Court verdict.The same family also got the statutory/customary right of occupancy. The other family in the dispute claims the judge erred in law and it is challenging the verdict at the Court of Appeal in Ibadan, Oyo State, reports Seyi Odewale.

    The Appeal Court in Ibadan has been asked to set aside the October 8 verdict of an Ijebu-Ode High Court in Ogun State, that about 117.188 hectares of land in Itele-Aiyetoro community of Ado-Odo/Ota Local Government Area of the state, belongs to the Adogun Atele family, and not the Odutala family.

    The said judgment was based on suit numbers HCT/7/89 and HCT/212/96, which were consolidated in 2001. Justice O. A. Onafowokan heard the consolidated suits.

    The grounds of the appeal, according to the family represented by the trio of Mr Abiodun Adeniji Odutala, Mrs Fola Adeniji Odutala and Mrs Agbeke Adeniji Odutala, are that, “the learned trial judge erred in law in holding that the appellants’ family are customary tenants to the respondents’ family in the absence of oral and documentary evidence to buttress same”.

    They claimed that “there must be direct or circumstantial evidence before the court to substantiate the allegation that the appellants’family are customary tenants;

    That: “No cogent evidence was adduced by the respondents’ family as their customary tenants.”

    The judge, they said, “erred in law in failing to evaluate the entire evidence adduced before the court, or properly before entering judgment for the respondents by granting all their prayers;

    “The trial judge failed to consider the documentary evidence adduced by the appellants to prove their defence and counter-claim.

    “The learned trial judge misdirected himself of the laws and facts in arriving at his decision and that the judgment is against the weight of evidence.”

    They are seeking these reliefs: “An order setting aside the judgment of the Ogun State High Court, Ijebu-Ode Division delivered on October 8, 2013, and an order granting judgment to the appellants as per their counter-claim before the lower court.” No date has been fixed for the hearing.

    In the first suit, Chiefs Taoridi Dada and Edun Olowookere, on behalf of themselves and Adogun Atele family, sued the Odutalas and five others representing the whole village of Itele-Aiyetoro, otherwise known as Alagbeji Descendants family of Itele-Aiyeitoro village.

    The second suit was between Saibu Olugbode, Chief Kafaru Arowolo, Ayuba Dada and Bili Dabiri, representing themselves and the Alagbeji Descendants family of the same community, and Chiefs Dada and Olowookere, (representing Adogun Atele family) and the Odutalas.

    In his judgment, Justice Onafowokan held: “This is the judgment in two cases that were consolidated to be heard together. The two cases were filed long before I became a judge of the High Court of Ogun State in October 2000, but the lot to hear and determine them fell on me sometime in 2005, when the cases were assigned to my court.

    “The trial started in 2006. My involvement in election petitions assignments in Zamfara and Kano states in 2007 and 2008, and transfers in 2008 and 2011 from one judicial division of the High Court to another with attendant consequences, in my view, contributed greatly to the delay in early conclusion of the trial.”

    The judge said: “The first case, HCT/7/89 was originally commenced by Chief Oluwole Akapo and Madam Owotolu (for themselves and on behalf of the Atele family) against Abiodun Odutala and Madam Agbeke Odutala, claiming damages for trespass and injunction. In the course of the proceedings, the predecessors in the title of the claimants in HCT/212/96, on their applications, were on March, 1989, joined as the 4th to 8th defendants (for themselves and on behalf of Itele Community).

    “Notwithstanding their joinder, they proceeded to institute another action in Suit No: HCT/212/96; this time, suing for themselves and on behalf of members of Itele people, otherwise altogether known as Ogungbemi Alagbeji descendants’ family against the plaintiffs and 1st to 3rd defendants in HCT/7/89.”

    In the first suit (Suit HCT/7/89), according to the judge, the plaintiffs declared, as opposed to those of the defendants, that they “are the persons entitled to customary/statutory rights of occupancy in respect of the vast area of the land situate, lying and being at Aiyetoro Village, Itele in Ogun State of Nigeria, which is more particularly described on plan no. PEG/06/2001/025 dated 28/12/2001 drawn by J.O Olorunkunle (registered surveyor);

    “That the 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants are customary tenants of the plaintiffs on the land in dispute.”

    They then wanted “an order for forfeiture of the customary tenancy of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants or of whatever interest or interests they have in the land in dispute on the ground that they have committed acts inconsistent with and in defiance of the plaintiffs’ title to the land in dispute;

    “An order for recovery of possession of the land in dispute from the 1st , 2nd and 3rd defendants by denying the title of the plaintiffs to the land in dispute and by selling and leasing part of thereof, and by various other forms of misconduct;

    “A declaration that all sales, leases or purported sales or any other forms of alienation made by the 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants affecting the land in dispute is null and void and

    “An order of perpetual injunction restraining the 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants-their privies, servants or agents from further selling or leasing the land in dispute or any portion thereof or from going on the said land for any purpose at all or from doing anything whatsoever on it.”

    In the 1st to 3rd defendants’ counter claims against the plaintiffs and the 4th to 8th defendants (Kafaru Abudu Arowolo, Chief Raufu Ilo (Baale of Itele), Mr Saibu Olugbode, Mr Ayuba Dada and Mr Bili Dabiri), claimed “that they are trustees of Odutala family and are entitled to the issuance of the statutory/customary right of occupancy in respect of that area of land situate and being in Aiyetoro and described and delineated by Survey Plan No OGE/ABB/90 prepared by S. Akin Ogunbiyi Esq. Licensed Surveyor on 20/9/90 and known as parcel A,B and C (measuring respectively 88.294 hectares; 2.511 hectares and 26.383 hectares)”;

    “A declaration that the claimants nor the 4th to 8th defendants have any title to the area claimed by the 1st to 3rd defendants.”

    They then sought “a million naira damages against the claimants and the 4th to 8th defendants for trespass committed on the land” and “a perpetual injunction restraining the claimants, the 4th to 8th defendants, their servants, agents and/or privies from further committing acts of trespass on the land”.

    The 4th to 8th defendants also filed their counter claims against both the plaintiffs and the 1st to 3rd defendants. Against the 1st and 2nd plaintiffs, they declared that “the ‘Itele people’ described in another Suit No. 17/43-Alimi Akapo and others versus D.D Olukogbon “are the ten branches of the 4th to 8th defendants’ families in Suit No HCT/212/96, comprising (1) Ipotobo families (2) Iliwo families (3) Isunba families (4) Ijaganna families (5) Ilekemo families (6) Ilegbede families (7) Ilogun families (8) Isalu families (9) Idotele families and (10) Idomo families called ‘Itele people’ who are otherwise all together known as Alagbeji Descendants family of Itele town.”

    They declared: “The first plaintiff (Jimoh Arowolo) is not a blood relation, nor a family member of any of the 10 units of families known and described as ‘Itele people’ (the owner of Itele Village and its vast area of land), who are otherwise altogether referred to as Alagbeji descendants’ family of Itele town.” There were other declarations by them.

    They then sought the “forfeiture of the 1st and 2nd plaintiffs’ customary rights in Itele village for denying the plaintiffs’ family title of Itele village/town and its whole land.”

    They also sought an “order of possession (by the 4th to 8th defendants) of any portion of land held by the 1st and 2nd plaintiffs within the said entire Itele land as in Survey Plan no. BAC/44/OG/97.”

    In their claims against the 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants (Abiodun Odutala, Mrs Fola Adeniji Odutala and Mrs Agbeke Adeniji Odutala), they declared that their ancestor, Erigi Odutala is a customary tenant of the 4th to 8th defendants;

    That: “First, second and third defendants are not entitled to any statutory right of occupancy in respect of any portion or parcel of land situate, lying and being at Aiyetoro Village which formed part of the whole land belonging to the 4th to 8th defendants as landlords of the said 1st, 2nd and 3rd defendants.” All these, among others, were the prayers sought by them at the lower court.”

    When The Nation visited the town there was unease. Some people spoke in hushed tones, others expressed fear that the victorious family could ask them to vacate the land, especially, when Chief Abiodun Adeniji Bada –Odutala (1st defendant) has been asked to stop parading himself as the head of the community.

    “Properties are at a risk, not only our lives,” said Adewumi Adeniji, a resident. “We heard that the opponents had hatched their plans to destroy landed property built here, but I am promising you that they will not go far as we have all documents to back our landed property up,” he added.

    Another resident said: ”I have been living here with my family members for seven years and there was peace until recently when some hoodlums are saying we must vacate our land and relocate to another place because our community head had lost the case. Are we going to leave here and relocate to another area or where are we going to?”

    But the Baale appeared not disturbed by the judgment. “I have gone to the Appeal Court to appeal the case because the judgment of the High Court was improper and could be a mistake. It was the Alake of Egbaland who made me the community head of Ayetoro-Itele  and  seven  months after  my installation  the Olota  of Ota made one Edun Sunday Olowokere,  who is an Awori the head of Ayetoro to cause confusion. I am the 8th Baale, and this Olowokere was the first to be pronounced as Baale.

    “They tell a lot of lies against us. All what Olowokere said in some newspapers are tissues of lies. The Egba own Aiyetoro by conquest and history is there for all to see. Alake is still alive to testify to this. I have never heard how a tenant becomes a landlord,” he said.

    “This town has been in existence for about two centuries, having been founded by the Egba warriors known as the Ajagunnas between 1836 and 1842 and for a judgment to now tell us that we are tenants to people whom we had never paid any tribute to and no demand of such had ever been made; for any judge to say we are tenants on our land is not acceptable and we believe it is a rape of justice. And that is why we are pursuing the matter legally to the highest level the law can take us,” he added.

  • Itsekiri floor Ijaw in historic land tussle

    The Ijaw people of Ogbe-Ijoh Kingdom in Warri, Delta State, have suffered a setback in a legal battle with their Itsekiri counterparts over the ownership of a parcel of land in the oil city.

    A Warri High Court threw out their joinder application in the suit between the Itsekiri people of Okere Itsekiri community and the Delta State Government.

    The involvement of the Ogbe-Ijoh people added a new dimension to the ownership of the 3.197 hectres of land on which the government is building a model school.

    Ogbe-Ijoh leaders, led by Dr. Clarkson Aribogha, applied to be joined in the suit as defendants claiming ownership of the same parcel of land.

    In the application backed by a 20-paragraph affidavit, they claimed that the land was owned by Ewein, a powerful Ijaw patriarch and founder of Ogbe-Ijoh Kingdom, “at a time now beyond human memory.”

    In their response, the Okere-Itsekiri people insisted that the Ijaw were only seeking “to reap where they have not sown”, adding that in the history of the foundation of Warri kingdom there was nowhere the name of any Ijaw man named Ewein was mentioned.

    Consequently, they (Itsekiri) prayed the court to strike out Ogbe-Ijoh’s application as was done by a Warri High Court dated July 9, 1964 and affirmed by the Supreme Court in SC/450/65.

    Dismissing the application, Justice M. Mukoro said: “From the discussion so far based on legal principles, judicial authorities, fact before me is that this application for joinder is a back-door attempt to revive an action laid to rest since July 1964.

    “Any attempt to go against the ruling of the Warri High Court and its affirmation by the Supreme Court is tantamount to judicial rascality, recklessness and unconstitutional voyage. Public policy demands that there shall be an end to litigation.

    “I find merit in the opposition to the application for joinder. The application for joinder filed on November 27, last year, lacks merit and that being so it shall be dismissed. So be it.”