The estate management has ordered the closing of the estate gates in protest of the planned demolition of buildings in the estate, following the deployment of around 50 armed police officers in the Magodo Phase 2 Estate region of Lagos State.
The officers were claimed to have recently accompanied suspected land squatters and family members who raided the estate to claim property.
‘ID/795/88 Possession Taken Today 21/12/21 by Court Order,’ the group inscribed on several properties on the estate using red, brown, and blue inks during the invasion.
The accused family was reported to have led the group and armed police officers to the estate in order to carry out a Supreme Court order.
When the estate management ordered the gate to be closed, the mob was going to attack the estate with a bulldozer.
The Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, was said to have intervened to get the gates reopened when the Inspector-General of Police, Baba Usman, pledged to withdraw the cops.
Despite Sanwo-involvement, Olu’s the estate’s Chairman, Bajo Osinubi, claimed the policemen stayed in the community, adding that residents had been living in dread as the officers moved around with their weapons.
He added, “More than 50 armed policemen are still around and they are restless and didn’t go for Christmas and New Year. In the morning and evening, they carry their guns around and you can imagine what will happen if there is a disagreement between the group and residents and somebody was shot, what will be the reaction of the IGP.”
The Lagos State Government, on the other hand, characterized the invasion as unjustified and promised to pursue those responsible.
Tunji Abdulhameed, the Legal Adviser of the Magodo Residents Association, countered the idea that the verdict influenced the invaders’ activities by claiming that the 1993 judgment did not specify the area, property, or location of the parcels of land.
He added, “But for you to execute even when you get a judgment, you must still apply for a writ of possession and without it, you cannot enforce the judgment. So, when they applied for the writ of possession and it was approved, we challenged it and that was the time the residents association joined the case as we were not part of the case before they got the judgment.
“The essence of the closure of the gate was to create awareness to the public and to draw the attention of the government as to what is happening in Magodo so that we can get protection from them.”
