Oba Ogunwole; Vandalised property inside the palace
| credits: Jesusegun Alagbe
| credits: Jesusegun Alagbe
Many
people would perhaps think it’s only in Nollywood movies that some
disgruntled fellows would invade their king’s palace, shatter his
building and vehicles, beat the palace security guards mercilessly and
then cart away the crown, staff and other paraphernalia of office.
But in Aagba – a small community in
Boripe Local Government Area of Osun State which is about 40 minutes
drive from Osogbo – it did not happen in a movie; it was an awful
reality that the king, the Alaagba of Aagba, Oba Rufus Ogunwole, and the
residents of the town are yet to come to terms with.
Last Wednesday evening, a day after Maj.
Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), the presidential candidate of the All
Progressives Congress, was declared winner of the presidential election,
certain youths, claiming to be jubilating, wielding guns and machetes
in their hands, and chanting various protest songs, stormed the streets
of the town and headed straight for their monarch’s palace.
However, their target was not around.
On a visit to the monarch’s palace on
Monday, when the tension in the community seemed to have been doused,
Oba Ogunwole told our correspondent that he was lucky not to be around
during the invasion; otherwise, he said he would either have landed on
the hospital bed or in the grave to join his forefathers.
The hoodlums, belonging to a group
called the ‘Odo Oru’ – literally interpreted as ‘Night youths’ –
reportedly accused their monarch of working for the Peoples Democratic
Party and were unhappy about this; they claimed that their action was to
bring their monarch to order.
Before he became king, Ogunwole was a
former member of Osun State House of Assembly and a former special
adviser to former Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola on Legislative Matters.
On gaining entrance to the palace,
located by the roadside on the highway which links the town with Ikirun,
a neighbouring town in Ifelodun Local Government Area where one person
was killed on the eve of the election when certain supporters of the APC
and PDP clashed, great terror was unleashed by the violent youths.
To demonstrate that they meant business,
the youths were said to have asked for the monarch’s whereabouts, and
when they found out that he was not around, they started shooting
sporadically and vandalising every building and vehicle that was in the
premises of the palace, after they had succeeded in beating the palace
security guards.
Then they carted away the monarch’s crown, staff, palace official documents and some other paraphernalia of office.
The tale of a fleeing king
Dressed in skimpy white shorts, a red
polo shirt and a white skullcap, Oba Ogunwole narrated his side of the
story to our correspondent. “It was never about politics, but they are
using it as a disguise. There are certain persons in this town who are
aggrieved ever since 2009 when I became the king,” he started.
The monarch, however, confessed he was a
member of the PDP prior to his emergence as a king. “Once you become a
king, you are no longer politically partisan; you accommodate everyone
irrespective of which party they belong to. So, they are definitely
hiding under the guise of politics,” he emphasised.
Before Oba Ogunwole would continue to narrate the genesis of the crisis about his kingship to Saturday PUNCH, he wouldn’t forget in a hurry to tell how he escaped being brutalised by the thugs on that fateful day.
“At about 4:30pm, I drove myself to
somewhere not far from the palace. As it was getting to 5pm, I received a
call from one of the people in the palace. When I picked it, I heard
loud screams of my people,” he said. “I asked the person who called me
what happened; he said the ‘Odo Oru’ members, wielding guns, had stormed
the palace, shooting. I speedily drove from where I was to the police
station where I met the DPO. I told him that something terrible was
going on in the palace and he quickly arranged for some policemen to
escort me.”
The Alaagba continued, “By the time we
got there, they had left the palace premises, so I drove into the
compound while the policemen who escorted me stayed outside. When the
youths heard the sound of sirens and saw the policemen, they returned
and faced them, shooting at the policemen. The cops, in return, shot
teargas to disperse the crowd, but when they discovered that they were
not yielding, the policemen drove off as they were almost overwhelmed
and did not want to kill any of them.
“I too found a way of escape and fled by
foot. The thugs returned to the palace and vandalised the car I just
parked in the compound. It was after they left that I discovered they
took away my crown, staff, some official documents (which contained
palace minutes and correspondences) and others.
“They wounded someone, but the person is
recovering. He was with them when they were hiding under the guise of
rejoicing over the declaration of Buhari as winner of the election. But
as soon as they started destroying things, he confronted them and they
attacked him.”
After wreaking damage to the monarch’s
property, the hoodlums had reportedly also gone to the residences of the
various chiefs of Alaagba and vandalised the places too, including
those of the Eesa of Aagba, Chief James Bamigbola, who acts as the
monarch’s deputy.
Some chieftains of Aagba and other residents had left the town due to the terror that the hoodlums inflicted upon them.
“Some have fled the town; their children
who live in cities have all come to fetch them due to fear. It was hot
here throughout last week; things are just calming down a bit. I just
thank God that they did not kill anybody. My family is fine,” Oba
Ogunwole expressed a bit of relief.
The real story behind the scene
The former Alaagba of Aagba, Oba Felix
Abidoye, died after a 43-year reign in 2008, and then there was a need
for replacement – the 10th king that would rule the community.
In the ancient town, there are three
families that could produce the king in succession order – the
Fatorisas, the Ahunloyes and the Odeyales. So in 2009, the process began
and it was the turn of the Fatorisas.
Meanwhile, in the Fatorisa family, there
are again three heirs among whom the kingship title is rotated and
according to Oba Ogunwole, he was the next heir to take on the mantle
because the other two heirs had produced kings before.
However, there was fire on the mountain.
Oba Ogunwole said, “In each of the three
families, there are also heirs to the throne. In my own family –
Fatorisa ruling house – that’s the first in the hierarchy. The first
king of this town emerged from there.
“There are three heirs in my family and
the other two had been kings before, so when it was my turn, the two
other heirs colluded to say we were not part of the family again.
Everyone said kings had emerged from their parts before, but they were
not happy. That’s where the problem began. It’s an internal conflict.
“So since 2009 when I was crowned king,
they had been disturbing the peace of this town. Last week’s violence
was not a new one. Some people in this community gathered them to foment
trouble when we were in the struggle for the next kingship of the
community.
“They employed thugs who caused the
mayhem. They said they don’t want me; they said they were not satisfied
with my emergence as the king of the town and want to remove me, but
they are disguising under the umbrella of politics to perform their
atrocities. A king doesn’t practise politics. I have resigned from it.”
For the past six years, Saturday PUNCH found
out that after every election or political event – whether at the
national, state or local level – the king’s palace had always been
invaded by the violent group, purposely to injure and scare the monarch
to resign from the throne.
For instance, after the August 9, 2014
governorship election in the state that Governor Rauf Aregbesola of the
APC won, the same group invaded the monarch’s palace (he wasn’t around
again that time) and carted away some goods, after causing mayhem.
“That’s their plan, but it will never be
possible,” Oba Ogunwole reiterated. “For any political event, they hide
under the cloak that I was a PDP member to perpetrate this crime. After
the last governorship election in the state, they came and destroyed
the roofing sheets in the palace. It was August 10, the second day after
the election and the third day after I received judgement from the
court of appeal that I would remain as king. They dragged me to the
lower court, I won; they went to the court of appeal, I won again.”
Whether the carting away of the
paraphernalia of office had any implication, the Oba said, “There is no
serious implication, whatever. They can never get to where the ancestral
crown and other paraphernalia of office are placed. The ones they stole
were just for outing purposes and I have many of them.”
Nonetheless, the police have been
searching for the other items that the hoodlums carted away – after some
hunters who were going to the farm on Sunday evening found some of the
palace documents in a bush.
The commissioner of police in charge of
the elections in Osun State, Sam Okaula, said 10 suspects had been
arrested in connection with the violence and were being detained for
interrogation. If they were found culpable, they would be charged to
court for causing the unrest, he said.
A former Commissioner for Local
Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Mr. Kolapo Alimi, said the state had
no basis to be involved in the tussle. The Osun State government has
yet to appoint a new commissioner for the office.
An injured youth
Alimi told our correspondent that it’s
an issue that could only be settled by a court of law – which Oba
Ogunwole earlier said he had been taken to.
Alimi said, “The act is highly
abominable and condemnable. They have been in the tussle for the throne
for quite some time now. Some people are saying he’s not entitled to the
throne and are using his political background to disrupt his reign.
“Before, he was a card-carrying member
of the PDP and he is still thought to be a PDP man by them. He was a
honourable member before he ascended the throne and maybe they thought
he still played a prominent role in canvassing for the people’s votes
for the party in the just concluded election.
“They’re just capitalising on the party
issue and they probably think that now that the APC won at the federal
level, they could do and undo. It’s a local affair and I believe it will
be resolved between them because the state has nothing to do with it.
“In fact, Governor Rauf Aregbesola has
never cared whether a monarch doesn’t support him or like his party;
he’s a liberal man. So like I said, the matter is a local and legal one
and the community has to abide by the ruling of the court.”
The other story of Aagba
After some days of unrest, a bumpy drive
to the town proved to our correspondent that being small does not mean
being peaceful. Even though Aagba is a small community, the tussle for
kingship has divided the residents and slowed down the pace of
development of the town.
It was no surprise, therefore, that an
indigene of the town who is a student of one of the tertiary
institutions in Osun State, simply identified as Bosede, told Saturday PUNCH that she could not afford to spend her whole life in the town.
She said, “There is no development here
because of the tussle; as you know, there can never be development in a
place where the people are always fighting over what’s not there. It’s
because of how local this place is. Imagine youths, who are supposed to
be doing something meaningful with their lives, attacking our monarch.
“How much were they paid to cause the
mayhem? They didn’t protest to the king that we don’t have good roads,
health centre, library and some other important infrastructural
facilities; they went to attack the king. Thank God he wasn’t around. I
think they need to get jobs – or which employed person would like to be
named ‘Odo Oru? According to their name, they are of darkness and that’s
why they are causing evil.”
A look at the schools and the maternity centre in the town showed how important Bosede’s argument was.
It was Easter Monday, the buildings were
shut and so our correspondent couldn’t gain full entry into the
facilities. Also, there were signals by the okada rider who carried our correspondent around the town to leave as soon as possible for security reason.
“I can’t guarantee we’re safe because
the hostility level is high in this town. They might think you have come
to spy or so and they don’t treat journalists with respect. If they can
attack the king every time like that, there’s no one they cannot
attack,” he warned.
However, beholding rusty roofing sheets,
absence of potable water supply and broken pavements, to say that the
environments of both the schools and the health centre were unappealing
would be an understatement.
“I have not heard this kind of thing
before; I only watch it in movies. However, whoever is sponsoring such
group should be arrested and then it should be disbanded. Any group of
persons that cannot make their monarch sleep with his two eyes closed
are worthy of disbandment and made to face the full wrath of the law,” a
Lagos lawyer, Bisoye Odubona,
credits
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