Man Plans To Commit Suicide After Government Destroyed His N35m Filling Station

Ijebu-Ode-born businessman, Sola Oloko, had high hopes about investing in his state of origin. But for reasons he said he had yet to understand, attempts to make that dream come true have been met with an unexpected negative reaction from the Ogun State Government.

Oloko said he got a call from a frantic worker on May 14 that everything he had built with about N35m on his 2,593sq metre land along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway had been destroyed by state government officials.

Oloko was obviously depressed when he narrated how all the joy he hoped to derive in contributing to the development of his state, was turned against him.

He told Saturday PUNCH that he got a summon to appear that same day (May 14, 2015) at the Ministry of Urban and Physical Planning in Abeokuta, on issues concerning the land.
Continue
“I was at home on May 14, when some of my workers on the land called and said a team of government officials with mobile policemen in tow came to the land and said I should appear at the Ministry of Urban and Physical Development in Abeokuta. I went early to Abeokuta the following day with my documents with the hope of resolving any issue about the land with the ministry,” he said.

But while he was at the ministry, a government demolition team allegedly led by the Director-General of the Ogun State Bureau of Lands and Survey, Mr. Wale Osinowo, (who held the position until the Ogun State Governor, Ibikunle Amosun, dissolved his cabinet on May 25, 2015), went to the site and reduced the structures to rubble.

“I was shocked when I was told that the place was being demolished. How could that happen? I run as many as nine filling stations in the state as part of my contribution in investing in my state. The state government has always said there is need for investments in the state. What then have I done wrong?” he said.

When our correspondent asked Oloko if he had all the required documents of his land, he promptly presented C of O and land use permit which were duly signed by the state surveyor-general.

“I bought the land legally and got the certificate of occupancy and other documents which were duly signed by the surveyor-general of the state in 2010. I started construction in 2011. But work on the site was delayed because of the slow pace of the work by Bi-Courtney on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, I had to suspend the project.

“I only recommenced work on the site when Julius Berger took over the construction of the road. So far, I have spent N35m on the project. When the government bulldozers came, they did not even mind that I already had massive fuel tanks buried in the site, they reduced everything in sight to rubble.”

Upon his appointment as the Director-General of the Bureau of Lands and Survey, Osinowo, vowed a clampdown on land speculators.

Osinowo had said at the time that plans were underway to reclaim all properties illegally acquired in different parts of the state.

Oloko said his land was acquired legally because he never liked doing things in such a way that he would run foul of the law.

“If the government has some clarifications to make on my land, why go behind me to demolish the place if not because this is deliberate?” he said.

Saturday PUNCH learnt that no official stop-work order was issued on the property by the Ministry of Urban and Physical Planning; neither were the structures marked for demolition at any point in time as stipulated by law.

According to section 53 of the Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Act where an unauthorised development is being carried out, the concerned government agency has the right to issue a stop-work order “pending the service of an enforcement notice on the owner, occupier or holder.”

Section 56 of the act states further that the “control department shall give a reasonable time not exceeding 21 days within which the developer shall be required to comply” with the provisions of the stop-work order.

Oloko said this was why he believed that the demolition of his property was an action brought about by animosity towards him.

According to him, destroying a multi-million naira project without taking steps stipulated by law is taking impunity too far.

“Is this the change the government has been telling people to expect?” he said.

However, the Ogun State Ministry of Urban and Physical Planning said it