Many residents of part of Kudeti, a suburb of Ibadan, Oyo State, have fled their homes and abandoned their shops in the aftermath of the siege to the community by thugs operating under the group name of ‘one million boys.’
‘One million boys’ and a rival group of thugs had been locked in violent clashes in the last two weeks, while scores of people, mainly innocent residents of the community, have reportedly lost their lives to the clashes.
When Sunday Tribune visited, the thickly populated community, particularly Adebiopon Street, which is directly opposite the Cathedral Church of Saint David, was deserted and all shops, whose owners were lucky that they were not razed by the thugs, were under lock and key.
A combined team of anti-riot and regular policemen in about 10 patrol vehicles combed the length and breadth of the area and adjoining streets, ostensibly to allay the fears of the residents about a recurrence of the mayhem.
Speaking with Sunday Tribune in Yoruba language on condition of anonymity, a resident said a hairdresser who was in her shop after celebrating end-of-the-year get-together with her colleagues was shot dead in the mayhem.
He added that an old man, who was mortally wounded in the incident, died just before the junction to Idi Aro Police Station on Friday.
He said it was pathetic that the age bracket of the youths who call themselves ‘one million boys’ was between 18 and 28, adding that a peaceful future could not be guaranteed with the number of youths taking to violence as entrepreneurship.
“The kind of guns that these youths carry shows that the security operatives need to first mop up all the guns in the house in the area and follow it up with a manhunt for the leaders of the groups. I don’t live at Kudeti but I have a shop here,” he said.
The situation at the trouble spot can be likened to a case of two contrasting cathedrals. The first is the popular Cathedral Church of Saint David located in Kudeti. The second is that Kudeti, apart from housing the Anglican cathedral, also serves as the ‘cathedral’, the headquarters of ‘one million boys.’
Owner of one of the shops burnt in the tragic incident, Mrs Ayodele Opeyemi, who was teary-eyed in front of her razed shop when Sunday Tribune visited, appealed to Governor Abiola Ajimobi for help, as everything she had had been lost to the incident.
She showed Sunday Tribune the remnants of about N90,000, she kept in the shop before the incident.
“On Thursday night, we just saw a group of youths in a Micra car, one tricycle and about four motorcycles at about 8:10 p.m. They got down and started shooting into the air. People in the streets started running helter-skelter in the ensuing pandemonium.
“I fled my shop like others and from where I hid myself, I saw them throw something into my shop and shot at that thing and my shop caught fire. I overheard one of them telling his colleagues to set all the other shops ablaze. Even the shops in the house where we hid were equally razed.
“We had to run for cover elsewhere through the backdoor, after a part of the building got engulfed in the fire. After a while, firefighters came and the boys in the street joined in putting out the fire.
“What we heard was that some boys in the area clashed with some guys from Abe Igi area and that the clash started about two weeks ago. But the elders in the area said they had resolved the dispute among the boys and that we should put our minds at rest.
“Government should please, come to our aid and assist us. The goods in my shop were worth N500,000 and I got the money on loan. We all know how the country is. The finance people from whom we got loans have been on our neck and only gave us some relief after they saw that my shop was actually burnt,” she said.
Another victim, Mr Ayinla Adedeji, who operates a barbing salon he valued at over N300,000 and which was also razed in the incident, said the thugs threw a petrol-soaked bread and shot same, following which fire resulted.
“This environment in the last two weeks has been terribly chaotic. The police were not aware initially. I had just renovated my salon. I tiled the floor, bought two new generators and four new clippers.
“I did all this in readiness for the festivities of the season when we expect sales to go up. I was in my shop when they came. I was almost hit by their bullets. They threw petrol-soaked bread into my shop and shot at it and fire resulted,” he said.
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