By Ejiofor Alike
- Fire razes estimated N50m property in Igboho’s house
The Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland, Chief Gani Adams, has called on the Yoruba nation to be well-coordinated in their efforts to fight the raging insecurity in the South-west.
Adams, who featured yesterday on ‘The Morning Show,’ the flagship breakfast programme of ARISE NEWS Channel, the broadcast arm of THISDAY Newspapers, lamented that the Yoruba have a penchant of destroying their warriors.
Also yesterday, another Yoruba rights activist, Chief Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho, put the value of assets destroyed at his old house that was set ablaze by arsonists in Ibadan at N50 million.
Adams accused some Yoruba politicians of trying to use Igboho to malign him and destroy all that he has built in the last 28 years by calling him “a coward.”
He said: “On the braveness of Sunday Igboho, some wicked politicians in Yorubaland have stepped in to use him to destroy their enemies and to even call them names. How can somebody call Iba Gani Adams that has been in the trenches for the past 28 years a coward?”
Igboho had issued and enforced a vacation order to Fulani herdsmen accused of perpetrating crimes ranging from kidnappings, killings, rape to the invasion of farmlands with their cattle in Igangan, Ibarapa Local Government Area of Oyo State.
Adams noted that some politicians have infiltrated the struggle for a secured space despite the genuine concerns by Igboho to fight for his people.
Adams said Igboho has the genuine interest of the Yoruba at heart but some politicians have infiltrated the struggle to “malign me and dent my image.”
According to him, “I started this struggle at the age of 23 years when OPU (Oodua Peoples Union) has not been on the ground. We started OPU in 1994 and I risked everything for Yorubaland. I have been to jail three times. The total of my detention was seventeen-and-a-half months. I lost everything I had in this life. I started from scratch in 2008 and I didn’t surrender because my people have to be liberated.
“How can somebody now come out – Sunday Igboho –and use his braveness of one day to destroy somebody who has been in the struggle for 28 years. There is more than meets the eye.
“Yoruba always destroy their warrior at the end of the day. About 78 per cent of those that fought for the people, they destroyed them. We know what happened to Abiola. A lot of the people who asked him to declare himself as president ran away from him when he was arrested.
It was just a few people in NADECO that stood by MKO Abiola.”
Adams said the Yoruba nation has to be well-coordinated in its liberation struggle.
“Why should you say I’m a coward by now? I have five children and the whole of my family (members) are still living with Nigerian passports. I am a convener of Oodua Progressives Union.
“Ten years ago, my people in Europe told me to get a European passport; they wanted to do it for me within two years. I told them they will use it against me in the struggle of Nigeria and they will say I can’t fight for them again. So, I rejected it and I and my family (members) are still living with Nigerian passports and still living in the country,” he said.
Adams accused security operatives of wanting to arrest Igboho for political reasons.
Adams said: “It was not only Sunday Igboho that security operatives targeted for arrest, but I was also the number one person for arrest. I was targeted for some political reasons.
“The same people who attacked and condemned us in 2015 using social media are now coming to portray themselves as activists to use Sunday Igboho.
“Now, we woke up to hear his (Sunday) house got burnt. Who are the people that went to burn Sunday Igboho’s house that is not in the forest?
“The issue with Sunday Igboho’s braveness now is that he has been used to destroy some political enemies.”
When asked if he and Sunday Igboho have spoken on the activities of renegade herdsmen, he said: “I have only met Sunday Igboho once and that was at a function. The other times we spoke were on phone.”
Fire Razes N50m Property in Sunday Igboho’s House
Meanwhile, Igboho yesterday put the value of assets destroyed by arsonists who torched his old house in Ibadan at N50 million.
The house was set ablaze by unidentified men in the early hours of yesterday.
Narrating the incident, Igboho told journalists that the arsonists fired gunshots before breaking in.
He said: “Around 3.30 am today, my younger ones residing at my old house rushed to my gate to wake me up, saying some bandits came to the house, fired gunshots, broke the gate and set the house ablaze. The two people at the house managed to escape. By the time I got there, the bandits had escaped. So, we called firefighters to help us put out the fire.”
On why he is against herdsmen, Igboho said their atrocities in Yorubaland are preventing peace from reigning.
“These Fulani are killing our brothers in our fatherland. They’re killing, raping, and kidnapping. All the things they are doing to us are not good. That’s why I’m trying to unite our people so that we can chase them away for peace to reign in Yorubaland,” he said.
He expressed the belief that those who attacked his house must have had help from some Yoruba.
“What I find surprising is that some Yoruba are in support of the herdsmen to set my house on fire. I’m saddened by it,” he said.
When asked who he suspected to be behind the attack, he said: “For now, I do not suspect anyone.”
“When they knew they could fight, fire gunshots and set a house ablaze, isn’t it where I stay that they are supposed to come? If they had come to the house where I stay, I would have had evidence for you people (journalists) because they won’t all escape. It’s either you meet their bodies or meet them with broken legs. I thank God that they applied wisdom by going to a house where they know that I don’t live and destroyed my property and burnt it down,” he stated.
He said his younger brothers who were at the house during the incident escaped unhurt, noting that the incident has been reported to the police who had come to inspect the scene.
