Popular Lagos lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), has said popular Yoruba rights activist, Sunday Adeyemo, more known as Sunday Igboho, had no right to issue a vacation notice to Fulani herders in the Ibarapa Local Government Area of Oyo State.
Recall that Sunday Igboho had asked Fulani settlers in Ibarapa to leave the area within seven days following increasing criminality such as kidnapping for ransom, killings, rapings destruction of farms and produce with cattle. He accused the settlers of perpetrating the crimes, harbouring or abetting the criminals.
At the expiration of the ultimatum last week, he and his followers had stormed the Fulani settlement in Igangan to eject Seriki Fulani, Salihu Abdukadir, and the herders.
Speaking on BBC on Wednesday, Falana said the affected herders should seek redress in court. He counselled against violence saying, “ don’t let us resort to violence; it is unnecessary.”
“With profound respect under our laws, even a squatter cannot be ejected and that is why on a daily basis, tenants are given quit notices by landlords or owners of properties” he said, adding that a private citizen could not wake up and say anybody should leave a community.
“Nobody can do that, not even the government because section 43 of the constitution says every citizen shall have the right to own and acquire properties in any part of the country.
“The campaign of the human rights community is that if you are born in a place, or you have lived for not less than ten years in any part of the country, you should be considered an indigene and be entitled to all the rights and privileges of the so-called indigenes of the state. So, for me, there is no way I can embrace anyone who has given quit notice to any group of people.”
The lawyer said criminal elements must be identified, arrested and prosecuted without an entire ethnic group being labelled as criminals.
He said the failure of the government to prosecute those paraded by the police for state offences had resulted in a situation where private citizens issue quit notices to people of other tribes.
“We need to have ranches, in Oyo State in particular. The largest abattoir in West Africa is located in Oyo State but the state government has not allowed the abattoir to function for the past nine years. Is that how to run a country?
“The scientific way of solving this problem has been abandoned. So, why would a Sunday Igboho not take over the government of that state? That is what is going on.
“There are genuine fears and facts on ground that the lives and properties in that state and in many states of the country are not safe”.
He called on the government to remove the basis for the quit notice by protecting the lives and properties of citizens.
