Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State has ordered demolition of structure housing illegal detainees in Ojoo area of Ibadan.
Makinde stated this on Tuesday when he visited Olaoore Central Mosque, Ojoo. There, Makinde told the state Commissioner of Police, Shina Olukolu to release over 259 detainees.
Mr Makinde visited the detainees’ venue in the company of top government functionaries. Governor Makinde said: ”It was an eyesore and unbelievable that such action could be ongoing in such an open city.”
He further said: “What we have seen is something that we all have to condemn. And this shouldn’t be happening in a modern environment.
”You can’t use a mosque as facade to perpetrate this kind of evil. “Yes, we have marked the entire structure for demolition. We have the ministry of lands and urban planning and ministry of health and justice who take care of that.
”This government will do everything humanly possible to ensure that this kind of thing is stamped out in our environment.
“But, there are houses around here. The people in those houses should have seen these people and say something. They should say something because this kind of things couldn’t have been going on without their knowledge.
So, they should have reported this thing to the authorities and maybe we would have unravelled this a long time ago.
“And also, we want to encourage our people, the government, the parents and even family members. If you need to rehabilitate members of your family that are misbehaving, we have government institutions that can do that. And we are trying to rehabilitate those places for the people of Oyo state.
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“So, we will look at the laws of our land regarding this kind of thing. We will ensure we get this place away from those people doing this kind of things. We will do it within the ambit of the law.
And also you have the law enforcement agencies here. All those involved are going to be prosecuted to the full extent of our law.
“For the victims, we have mobilized the ministry of women affairs and social inclusion and the social welfare agencies there.
First, we need to have immediate palliative for them. And then we have to look at the deeper issues and how to resettle them and reunite them with their families. We are not going to leave them alone at this point.”
