Oyo: Two killed, bulldozers burnt as police, NURTW clash

Two persons were killed and several others injured in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, on Thursday as the state government attempted to demolish the secretariat of the proscribed state council of the National Union of Road Transport Workers in Olomi/Academy area.

The dead victims, Nurudeen Azeez and Ismaila Agbojo, were members of a faction of the union loyal to the court-reinstated Chairman, Alhaji Lateef Akinsola (a.k.a Tokyo). They were killed in a gun battle between NURTW members and armed police escorts of officials of the state Ministry of Environment and Water Resources led by the Commissioner, Alhaji Mukaila Aborode.

Some of the injured were said to have been rushed to undisclosed hospitals for treatment.

No sooner had the demolition squad arrived the area at about 8am than members of the union, who had kept a close watch on the secretariat since the union’s leadership crisis began, resisted their move. Sound of gunshots rent the air as residents of the area and passers-by fled to safety.

As news of the shootings spread, tension and fear gripped other parts of the state capital. The clash forced the demolition team and their escorts to flee the area.

The NURTW members succeeded in burning some of the bulldozers brought for the demolition and also fired at the tyres of the Armoured Personnel Carriers in the team’s convoy.

“We went there with over 300 armed policemen. We never imagined that we could be confronted with such a huge resistance.

“The kind of arms available to those hoodlums is enormous. If we had confronted them, the casualty figure would have been too high. That was why we retreated,” a source in the demolition team told GidiGlobe.

Hours after the officials beat a retreat, suspected NURTW members armed with machetes, guns, sticks, broken bottles and assorted charms were seen parading the area in groups. As at 1pm when our correspondent left the scene, the situation was still tense, with residents afraid that the policemen might return with a reinforcement.

Smoke was still billowing from bonfires made on major roads such as the Academy end of the busy Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.

The Commissioner of Police, Oyo State Command, Mr. Baba Bolanta, told our correspondent that although he heard that two persons died in the encounter, he had not received any official confirmation of casualties. Bolanta insisted that since policemen did not shoot at the scene, adding that the dea may have been shot by NURTW members.

He said he advised the demolition squad to withdraw from the scene because he did not want a full blown confrontation between the police and NURTW members. Bolanta denied the allegation that he was part of the team, adding, “As a commissioner of police, what would I go there for?”

Bolanta said it was not true that a riot policeman died in the bloody encounter. Oyo State Governor, Otunba Adebayo Alao-Akala, had while receiving the national leadership of the union led by its National President, Alhaji Nojeem Yasin, recently vowed to go ahead with the demolition of the secretariat.

He said his administration intended to build a school on the land, noting that the demolition was informed by the incessant violent clashes associated with the union in the area.