Against the ruling of a Kwara state High Court sitting in Ilorin, some suspected land grabbers have forcefully halt the ongoing construction of a 200- capacity lecture hall at the Kwara state Polytechnic, Ilorin.
The land grabbers and some policemen, it was gathered, stormed the Kwara state premier institution’s campus Thursday to stop further work on the project undertaken by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund ( TETFund), allegedly on the order of an area court judge.
The area court judge, it was learnt, issued a stop- work order on the project, contrary to the position of the state high court.
It was gathered that the policemen that carried out the operation also whisked away three security officers of the polytechnic, namely, Alhaji Abdullahi Ajia, Dauda 0laiya and Abdulrahman kamaldeen.
Blueprint gathered that the arrested security officers have been remanded at the Ilorin custodial centre, Oke- Kura.
The state high court sitting in Ilorin and presided over by the chief judge of the state, Justice Abiodun Adebara, had in a ruling on a case before it on the encroached polytechnic’s land on June 5, 2023 upheld the objection of the institution to the claim of ownership of the land by some people.
It was further gathered that the management of the polytechnic would soon send a petition to the National Judicial Council (NJC) over the unacceptable conduct of the area court judge involved and his disrespect for the injunction of the state high court.
Blueprint recalls that the management of the polytechnic had a running battle with land grabbers who have illegally taken over a large chunk of the institution’s land.
The alumni association of the school under the leadership of Abu Salami, also addressed a news conference in Ilorin last Wednesday calling on the state government to assist the institution in recovering its vast land from the encroachers to allow for the development and growth of the state’s oldest tertiary institution.
And in response to the polytecnic’s alumni’s distress call, the state government through the chief press secretary to Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, Rafiu Ajakaye, at a media parley in Ilorin Thursday, asked the management of the institution to use all legal means to recover the institution’s encroached land.
