A private company recently forced over 100 farmers in Ondo State’s Oluwa Forest Reserve to leave their land, and they have accused the state administration of manipulating their misery.
Farmers claim that the state government gave their acreage to the firm without including them in the process.
They claim that despite paying a N5 million annual tax to the state government on the land, farmers in over seven separate settlements with 45 camps have been driven from their land by the state government’s actions.
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The firm that purchased their lands, according to their representative, Mr. Adetoro Opeyemi, assaulted their farms with earthmoving equipment and uprooted their cocoa trees, the majority of which were bursting with seedlings.
He said: “In my camp, we have paid annual dues of N5 million to the government.We are surprised that our farmlands of over 20 years could be sold to an investor to plant what we already have in the farm.“““So, we are begging the government to consider our plight and look for somewhere else for the private investors to plant their palm trees.“It will surprise you to know that two farmers died recently out of frustration, after their cocoa plantations were destroyed,”
But the state government, in response, described the farmers in the forest reserves as illegal occupants.
The commissioner for information and orientation, Mrs. Bamidele Ademola- Olateju, insisted that government will not allow farming and hunting in its forest reserves any longer.
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