Drama unfolded in the Muslim Odinjo axis of Mapo Local Government Area of Oyo State on Sunday, March 29, 2020 when hoodlums from Akatapa and Opeyemi communities clashed and two persons lost their lives in the process.

The deceased persons, simply identified as Tunde and Wale, were residents of the communities.

Flavision gathered that the hoodlums, who were allegedly armed with deadly weapons, took advantage of the situation to burgle shops, damage and loot property belonging to residents and traders of the communities.

A resident, Basit Alaka, said that tension in the communities erupted when one resident, simply identified as Deara, allegedly mobilised some hoodlums to the Opeyemi community to illegally arrest his opponents and in the process, picked an unidentified victim, who had just returned from travel.

Alaka said the victim’s brother, upon learning about the development, demanded that Deara release his sibling, but the effort proved disastrous and it degenerated into a battle.

He stated,

The disagreement degenerated into a fight and Deara was injured with a cutlass. How Deara was attacked was that the hoodlums he brought into the community were on the street when he entered the Opeyemi community to apprehend the person who just returned from a journey around 9am.

Around 8.27pm, traders closed their shops early and residents quickly entered their houses, because of the fear of reprisal. Suddenly, we started hearing people shouting. The hoodlums used cutlasses and bottles to attack each other. They also burgled shops and stole property.

My house is close to the road, so, I witnessed the incident and how they burnt a kiosk and burgled shops. I also heard them saying that Wale was dead and that it was hoodlums from the Opeyemi community who killed him.

The situation was calmed when the police came; when we stepped out to observe what had happened, I saw that Wale was butchered with cutlasses. We were later told to leave the scene.

Another resident, Aina Adeshina, said the kiosk that was set on fire attracted the attention of the policemen to the crisis in the community. He added that while the policemen were patrolling the neighbourhood, Tunde’s corpse was discovered.

He stated,

Tunde was a taxi driver, who just returned from work. But when he could not find his brother during the clash, he had to go out to look for him and in the process, the hoodlums mistook him for his brother, attacked and killed him. He was slaughtered by hoodlums from the Akatapa community.

Over 15 shops were destroyed during the clash. Drinks were taken from some shops, broken and the bottles used as weapons during the clash. Some of the hoodlums were shouting that there would be reprisals; residents are now scared and tired of the activities of these hoodlums.

When contacted, the Oyo State Police Command’s Public Relations Officer, Gbenga Fadeyi, said two persons were killed during the confrontation. He added that the Commissioner of Police, Shina Olukolu, had ordered that the case be transferred to the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department for further investigation.

Fadeyi said,

The cause of the fight, which happened around 10pm, is not known. But when the youth from the Opeyemi and Akatapa communities were attacking each other, information got to the police that they were fighting at Akatapa along Idiaro, so we deployed our patrol vehicles in the scene and on getting there, those who were fighting ran in different directions.

But giving them a hot chase, the policemen sighted a kiosk that they had already set ablaze and in an attempt to extinguish the fire, the police got information that there was a corpse not far from where they were.

While recovering the corpse, we got information that another dead body had been found. So, in the course of attacking each other, two persons were killed. The corpses were taken to the mortuary. The case has been transferred to the SCIID for discreet investigation to unravel the cause of the fight.

Justin Nwosu

Justin Nwosu is the founder and publisher of Flavision. His core interest is in writing unbiased news about Nigeria in particular and Africa in general. He’s a strong adherent of investigative journalism, with a bent on exposing corruption, abuse of power and societal ills.