Lisoyi, Atobatele, Kadejo, Adebesin Dragged to Court in ₦400m Malicious damage Dispute Case

Four men, Olukayode Adeyemi Lisoyi, Chief Sikiru Olatunde Atobatele (Balogun Egba), Mr. Ade Kadejo and Mr. Kabiru Adebesin, have been dragged before the Ogun State High Court over allegations bothering on malicious damage dispute, intimidation and involvement in the alleged ill-treatment of a key community figure in Iboku-Aro.

The suit, filed in the Abeokuta Judicial Division, was instituted by Sunday Babatunde Aro-Oguntola, a block maker, farmer and heir apparent to the Baaleship of Iboku-Aro in Obafemi-Owode Local Government Area of Ogun State.

Aro-Oguntola describes the four defendants as non-indigenes who migrated into Iboku-Aro but later became land speculators involved in unauthorized sale and forceful takeover of large portions of the community’s land.

According to his statement of claim, the crisis intensified on June 21, 2021, when the defendants, through their lawyer S.T. Alausa, petitioned the Ogun State Commissioner of Police, accusing him and another Iboku-Aro indigene Adesina Solarin Adetokunbo, of criminal defamation. Acting on the petition, officers of the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID), Eleweeran, arrested him in Iboku-Aro and seized his phones and tablet.

He alleged that the police, acting at the instances of the defendants, drove him through several towns—including Abeokuta, Ishara, Sagamu, Odogbolu, Ijebu-Ode, Ijebu-Igbo and Ife-Ijebu—before abandoning him at night in Sakpon village. The next day, when he reported at Eleweeran as instructed, he said he and Adetokunbo were arrested again and detained at the Eleweeran Divisional Police Headquarters.

Aro-Oguntola further claimed that during the detention, officers tortured him and Adetokunbo, hanging them upside down in an attempt to force confessional statements out of them.

He said he told the police he could not write, but they drafted a statement and compelled him to sign it.

He further alleges that he was later brought before the Commissioner of Police, where the defendants were present, and pressured to apologise to them and sign an undertaking to withdraw an earlier land case, Suit No. AB/126/2017, pending before the High Court. Both he and Adetokunbo refused.

The four defendants in the pending suit are also defendants in the Iboku-Aro land case where they wanted the Claimant and Mr. Sholarin to withdraw the pending land matter but did not succeed. Because the Claimant and Mr. Sholarin refused to sell their consciences the these defendants they were further detained, tortured, paraded like common criminals then arraigned before the magistrate court first in Iro (where the mother of Kayode Lisoyi hails from) then the case transferred to Owode-Egba magistrate court.

In the judgement of the magistrate court the claimant was discharged and acquitted of all the five counts in the amended charges whilst Mr. Sholarin was given an option to pay fine.

In the present suit, Aro-Oguntola is asking the court to award ₦400 million in general damages, order the defendants to publish an unreserved apology in national newspapers, and compel them to compensate him with ₦460,000 for his seized mobile devices.

He is also seeking any additional reliefs the court may deem appropriate. Trial is yet to commence.