Community tackles LASU over land encroachment

Residents of Okokomaiko in Ojo Local Government Area of Lagos have raised the alarm that the Lagos State University is planning to take over their land.

They said they were aware that the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. John Obafunwa, was planning to extend the university’s territory into the community.

The head of the community, Chief Ishola Jatto, said the VC had vowed to extend the current fence demarcating the school land from the community, an indication that the residents of Okokomaiko would have to vacate part of the land they occupied at present.

Jatto said, “Okokomaiko has existed before LASU was established. Why is it that the school would now displace us?

“The VC was quoted somewhere as saying that Okokomaiko is a hideout for criminals, which is why we should be sent out of the land. Do the people you see here today look like criminals?

“Prof. Obafunwa has been going about saying the residents are encroaching on the land of the university. It is the other way round.”

The residents gathered under the umbrella of the Okokomaiko Layout Residents Association, displaying placards with various messages pleading with the state government to prevail on LASU not to encroach on their land.

The spokesperson for the community, Chief Marcel Amadi, said the community was duly recognised by the state government.

Amadi said, “In 1972, the Okokomaiko lands were put under global acquisition for public use, but in October 1994, the lands were excised back to the original land owners and published in the state government’s official gazette No. 38 Vol. 27 of October 1994.

“The LASU authorities have been going about alleging that the residents are the ones encroaching into the university’s land. That is absolutely not true. We have documents to back up our legitimate habitation here.”

Our correspondent saw copies of pages of the gazette mentioned by Amadi, in which the then military administrator of the state, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, gave notice of the excision of the lands. Okokomaiko was listed as No. 62 on the lists of the areas to be excised from the global acquisition.

“The state government recognised the need to provide land for the future generation of natives whose lands were acquired under the 1972 Notice of Acquisition,” the gazette stated.

Amadi said the governor should step into the matter to forestall any break down of law and order that might result from the controversy.

Asked if the community had approached the state government on the matter, Amadi said they held a meeting with the then Commissioner of Physical Planning in 2004 in which the government directed the university to fence off its land.

Our correspondent saw the fence still in place. It demarcates Okokomaiko from the university. Amadi said the LASU VC intended to break down the fence and extend the demarcation.

Some of the residents, who spoke with our correspondent, were quite emotional about the possibility of losing their landed property.

One of the residents, a retired banker, Mrs. Stella Anikwemwa, said all her retirement benefits were put into buying her land in the area and building a house.

“You think I will buy a land with my retirement benefit and my savings at that time without doing proper findings as to whether the land I was buying was legitimate?” Anikwemwa said.

Another resident, Mr. Arowosafe Oluwole, said he bought his land in 1995 and did not know how he and his family would survive if LASU evicted them from their own land.

“We are doing all these so that the state government would understand the plight of the residents here. If we are displaced, thousands of residents and their families would be rendered homeless,” he said.

A widow, Mrs. Chinelo Ezeokoli, who told PUNCH Metro she had six children, said she too bought her land legally in 1994.

However, the university’s spokesperson, Dr. Sola Fosudo, told our correspondent on the telephone that the only step the VC had taken was to alert the state government about the encroachment on the university’s land.

Fosudo said, “I can say for sure that there is an encroachment by the residents of Okokomaiko on the university’s land. The VC only alerted the state government to the issue.

“I believe it is not the place of the VC to take earth moving equipment there. Whatever step would be taken about it would be the decision of the government.

“The VC is in the best position to give details of the land encroached upon by the residents. But the residents are just playing to the gallery by going to the press about this issue.”