Demolition: Former Lawmaker violated order – Ondo Govt

The commissioner for physical planning and urban development in Ondo state, mr Rasheed Badmus has given reasons, the structures of former lawmaker in the state house of assembly, Afolabi Iwalewa was demolished along oda road in the state capital .

Iwalewa had claimed that the demolition of his property on Sunday was politically motivated, pointing accusing fingers to the Senior Special Assistant to governor Akeredolu on Special Duties and Strategy, Dr. Doyin Odebowale and Badmus.

Speaking with ROVING REPORTERS on mobile phone on Monday, the commissioner expressed disappointment over the claims of Iwalewa.

Badmus said the structure of Iwalewa had no approval and It was an illegal structure because there was no single document backing it up.

Badmus said “I don’t believe that he is being victimised. He is our party member and i believe we are together.This is a former honourable member of the Ondo state house of assembly and we recognize and respect him.

But the problem is beyond that. It is not about politics because if he can be telling us that he was being treated like that because of politics,i don’t believe in that .

We are one, we are all together. I didn’t know him before, i got to know him when some people wrote a petition to our office. In fact ,when they wrote the petition, i didn’t take any action because i believe he is our party member.

They wrote the same petition to governor’s office and they now minuted it to us.

The content of the petition was that the place is being used for restaurant and they constitute noise pollution on every Friday ,Saturday and Sunday. The people around there said they don’t sleep whenever the operators of the bar increased the volume of the sound system and it is affecting their health.

In that place there is commandant of army and many other VIP people living in that vicinity.

We then wrote to him ,asking him to stop that loud noise in that environment but he refused to stop.

We then placed an order on his fence to stop all business activities in that place.

When we noticed that he didn’t stop yet,we were just looking at him but he later came to me and i told him the need for government to act on the petition we received. We can’t because you are a party member and we keep mute on issues concerning the general public.

I still appealed to him to stop the noise. So when he refused , Dr Doyin Odebowale and others also complained over public nuisance the bar has caused and at the end of the day, Odebowale and some government task force went to remove all appliances in the bar in order for him to stop disturbing the public and brought them to our ministry.

When Iwalewa came to me ,i repeated it to him that he should not flout government order just because he is an APC member, that violating law will portray the state government as irresponsible.

I released those appliances to him. But to our surprise ,he continued making noise. It was later we discovered that the place has no approval. It is an illegal structure. No single document.

I even advised him to come to the ministry for us to perfect necessary documents ,he did not come.

And we can not sit down and allow the place to be of more threat to the life of those living in the area ,that was why we acted accordingly.

Iwalewa bought the land for residential purpose ,not for commercial use because it is a government land .

I believe that he should show understanding with us in the ministry because we have no choice than to demolish the bar . We have been on this thing for the past four months.”