The Kwara polytechnic officer said the school has the crisis of encroachment more with the caretakers who are farming on the land than the original villagers.
Dele Moses, Ilorin
The management of Kwara State Polytechnic in Ilorin has alleged that over 1,000 hectares of the school’s 4,500 hectares of land has been encroached upon by villagers.
The management therefore repeated its constant call on the state government to construct a perimeter fence round the school to shield the institution from further encroachment.
The school’s Director of Students Services, Surveyor Abubakar Aremu, who spoke on behalf of the management at a press conference in Ilorin, said that construction of development projects and infrastructure in the institution had been stalled due to the encroachment of the villagers.
Aremu, who was accompanied by some other members of the management said that threats, intimidation and litigation by the villagers, had served as stumbling block against the plan of the school to establish a school of agriculture.
He said that due to the encroachment, the polytechnic is finding it difficult to have some of its courses incuding Agricultural Technology and Agricultural Engineering acrredited by the National Board for Technological Education (NBTE).
He said: “Absence of adequate land space for the courses would be detrimental for the much needed accreditation when the accreditation committee comes back to see that we don’t have the land ready.”
Aremu, who said that he had been involved in the management of the institution’s land since 2013, explained that a total space of 5,400 hectares was acquired for the school in 1973 when it was established by the military administration of Colonel David Bamgboye.
He said when the institution ceded part of the land by 300 meters to the villagers, the land was reduced to 4,500 hectares.
Aremu explained that a total number of 122 families were adequately compensated as of July 6, 1974 and advised to move out of the land.
He said that the money paid to the original land owners varied according to the land space acquired by the state government.
He alleged that while many of the villagers refused to move out of the land to the ones made available for them for relocation even after collecting the compensation some of the villagers who had relocated came back to continue farming on the land.
The Kwara polytechnic officer however said that the school has the crisis of the encroachment more with the caretakers who are farming on the land than the original villagers.
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He said the school would not be discouraged from protecting the land by campaign of calumny he alleged the former owners who had been compensated were making.
“We’ll not be deterred by campaign of calumny or litigation by people already compensated. Kwara poly extends to Oyun river Bridge, Oloru, Oke Ose, Dangiwa. So, anyone occupying those areas are occupying Kwara poly land.
“It’s the responsibility of Kwara government to sustain the property to serve the educational purpose it was established for. We, as caretakers of the land, have our responsibility to see that it’s not encroached upon.
“It should also be stated that Kwara State Government didn’t take over the land but acquired the land for the benefit of general interest of construction of Kwara poly.
“We have some of the villagers as ad hoc staff and we also provide employment opportunities for them when available. We supplied them electricity from our 33KVA transformer, they get water from our Oke Apon dam, while we dug bore hole for them in some places. We also hold community peace meetings among them,” he stated.
Aremu commended the Emir of Ilorin, Ibrahim Sulu-Gambari, for setting up a mediation committee to resolve land disputes in Ilorin, saying that the establishment of the committee was already yielding results as many of the villagers are withdrawing court cases against the polytechnic.