…reads riot act to criminals, others
Adebola Owolola
Versatile and proactive Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) Ali Mohammed Ari, has resumed with a fast signal to criminals in Zone 2, comprising Lagos and Ogun states, to steer clear of the area.
Already, AIG Ari, who has promised them “hell” if they refused to quit the two states under his jurisdiction, has hit the ground running.
To make good his words, AIG Ali, penultimate week, shortly after resumption at his office in Onikan Lagos, arraigned a traditional ruler, the Baale of Oremola, who had been parading himself as the Baale of Shelewu in Ikorodu for illegal sale of family lands. The traditional ruler has since been remanded at the Ikoyi Prisons, where he’s now cooling off his heels.
Before the Baale’s arraignment, the Zone Two Police Zonal Headquarters in Onikan, Lagos, had equally investigated and found him and his accomplice, one Rasheed Kalejaye and others, liable following several heinous allegations bordering on land grabbing and malicious damage to property levelled against them.
They were charged and arraigned at Court Two at the Chief Magistrate Court, Yaba, Lagos, penultimate week.
In one of the various petitions against the Baale and his accomplices, which emanated from the office of Lordwingate Law Chambers, the traditional ruler, who had been parading himself as the “Baale of Shelewu,” but who indeed is the Baale of Oremola, was said to have curiously and unlawfully damaged several houses in the Igbogbo area of Ikorodu in Lagos State and consequently engaged in the bizarre embezzlement of family money, an allegation for which he was grilled by detectives.
The traditional land-owning family of Lare Olumo, comprising five branches, complained that the unwholesome activities of the Baale and his accomplice, Rasheed Kalejaiye, could cause the breach of the peace in the area.
The petitioners to the Office of the Inspector General of Police, Alkali Baba, pleaded with the IGP to use his good offices to carry out a discreet investigation of the matter with a view to getting justice.
According to them, “We are the bonafide and unchallenged owners of the vast parcel of land which constitutes the subject matter of this petition by virtue of inheritance from their forefathers, who by Yoruba Native Law and Custom and acts of farming, procreated, lived and inhabited the community known as Lare Olumo Descendant Village at Igbogbo, Lagos : it was discovered that the two suspects in consonance with several other land grabbers, had falsified and deceived several innocent and unsuspecting persons by fraudulently obtaining money from them despite the caveat placed by the family stopping them from impersonating and selling family land without valid authorization or family consent.
The petitioners informed the IGP that after the said petition, CHIEF SHOLA OLUGBODE and one MR RASHEED KALEJAIYE escorted by a gang of arms-wielding hoodlums and cultists they both hire and use at will to commit atrocities.
The family accused Rasheed Kalejaiye of selling land without family consent, alleging that he hurriedly fled to Paris, France, some weeks ago to escape arrest.
The family also said Kalejaiye, who also claimed to be a registered surveyor and member of the Nigeria Institute of Estate Surveyors and Valuers (NIESV), had, upon further investigation, been found to be a quack.
The petitioners asserted that the family held a meeting to unanimously stop both Shola and Rasheed from ever setting foot on the vast parcel of land at Lare Olumo Land at Igbogbo, adding that they must not act as representatives, agents or family members for the sale or lease of the large expanse of family land at Igbogbo henceforth and if they are seen anywhere around the RES at Igbogbo, they should be arrested and charged by Law Enforcement Agents and that all parcels of land they have claimed to have sold before now, would be regarded as a “false sale”, since none of the family members were aware of their nefarious and malevolent activities; neither were they given any written or express consent whatsoever to sell same”.
Against his boasting that he had many senior police officers on his payroll, Baale Shola Olugbode was arrested and consequently arraigned.
The family informed that “despite being invited by Oba Adeboruwa of Igbogbo for amicable settlement, these dangerous scoundrels in the family have ignored pleas by family members to give account and have instead continued unabated to sell, lease, gift out vast parcels of land and solely enrich themselves to the exclusion of all other family members.”
The legal practitioners representing the family told the office of the IGP that “our client needs your good offices to start a FORENSIC AUDIT & CAUSE DEEP INVESTIGATION of all aspects of FRAUD AND ARMED BRIGANDAGE committed by the duo of CHIEF SHOLA OLUGBODE and one MR. RASHEED KALEJAIYE and order them to render account of the illegal sale of family land to the tune of over N120,000,000 (One Hundred and Twenty Million Naira) and thereafter amassing various vehicles and landed property to the exclusion of other family members who are starving.
“That one of the family members, one Mr Wasiu Fasanya, who boldly confronted them and requested that they give account of the various illegal sale of property by the duo of Baale CHIEF SHOLA OLUGBODE and one MR. RASHEED KALEJAIYE, was brutally beaten, assaulted and his face battered; then some of the hoodlums with them were ordered by MR RASHEED KALEJAIYE to put MR WASIU in the boot of the vehicle he brought in and he had to fight his way to escape being KIDNAPPED FORCIBLY AGAINST HIS WILL before the duo zoomed off and escaped with their fellow hoodlums, leaving MR WASIU FASANYA alone in his own pool of blood.
“Those who accompanied Rasheed and Baale Shola to abduct Mr Wasiu Fasanya were also arrested and charged to court too by an Eagle Eyed Police Detective Gbenga from AIG zonal command Research & Planning Department, Onikan”.
The petitioners stated further: “That your good offices should write to the Provost Marshall, the GOC 81 Div and the top hierarchy of the Military Police to arrest anybody who lays claim to own the said land illegally, or maliciously damages another property and all those illegally planting any MILITARY ZONE signpost on their vast parcel of land at Igbogbo, as the entire family is NOT aware of such SALE to anybody or Nigerian Army Imposter”.
The Police have contacted the INTERPOL to issue a RED NOTICE for the International Warrant, repatriation and arrest of the fake Surveyor Rasheed Kalejaiye, who is now a fugitive.
A woman who was a victim of their acts of malicious damage, who simply identified herself as Beauty, was full of joy when she saw the Baale in handcuffs. She prayed for the police officers at the AIG Zonal Command for their proactive investigation.
She claimed Baale Shola of Oremola and Rasheed Kalejaiye, who had destroyed her foundation and fence, and had brought others to repurchase her land, had earlier denied knowing her when she reported them and they were invited by the police in Abuja.
She said she had finally got Justice with the arrest of both men by the police.
Several attempts made by our correspondent to hear from the embattled Shola Olugbode, who is the Baale of Oremola and his accomplices, were to no avail.
