By Dele Moses, Ilorin
The Asa Investments Limited and the Kwara State government have returned to court for adjudication over dispute on the revocation of land allocated to the company by the government.
The affected land is about three plots at the Iloffa Road at the Ilorin GRA on which Ile-Arugbo structure was built by the late political icon of the state, Olusola Saraki
The Asa Investments is said to be owned by Saraki who used the Ile-Arugbo structure on the company’s acclaimed land to host and organise welfare packages for his elderly political supporters.
The company resolved to go to court after the state government demolished the structure to reclaim the land on the ground that there was no legally acceptable evidence that the land had been allocated to the company.
The company had, consequent upon its substantive suit, filed a motion on notice for an interlocutory injunction asking the court to restrain the government from any further action on the land pending the determination of the suit.
However, before hearing the application, Justice Abiodun Adebara of the state High Court in Ilorin, advised the parties to seek a possible amicable resolution of the matter.
The parties, in the bid to explore an out-of-court settlement of the matter met twice in February at the state Governor’s Office through their representatives led by their respective lead counsel.
The out-of-court settlement meetings however collapsed as the parties could not agree on terms of settlement.
When they returned to court today (Monday), Justice Adebara fixed March 25, 2020 for hearing of the suit after the court was told of the collapse of the planned amicable settlement.
Counsel to the Asa Investment Limited, AbdulAziz Ibrahim, and that of the state government, Salman Jawondo, who is the state’s Attorney General told the court that the peace talks collapsed over irreconcilable differences on the term of amicable settlement of the dispute.
Ibrahim listed his clients terms of settlement to include “the reversal of the revocation order placed on the disputed land, reconstruction of the partially demolished structures on the land and offering of apology to the aged women that were harassed on the night when the structures were pulled down.”
He said the state government’s only term of settlement was the insistence that the revocation order placed on the disputed land stands because of public interest.
He, however, expressed the readiness of his clients to forgo the second and third demands in the interest of peace.
Jawondo, the counsel to the state government, said the peace talks collapsed “when the claimants came out frontally that their demand for the reversal of the revocation order placed on the disputed land was not negotiable.”
He sought for an adjournment for a proper hearing of the suit.
After listening to the argument and counter arguments by the counsel to the claimants and the defendants, Justice Adebara commended both parties and their counsel for meeting twice in their attempts to find an amicable resolution to the crisis as advised by the court.
He advised them to still forge ahead on an amicable resolution of the dispute.
“However, since the two parties had not been able to reach an amicable resolution of the dispute, the suit ought to continue and it is in this regard that the court will grant an adjournment for hearing.
“I hereby adjourn the case till March 25, 2020 for hearing,” Adebara ruled.