The Executive Chairman,
Egbe-Idimu Local Council Development Area,
Alimosho Local Government,
Isheri Olofin Roundabout,
Isheri Olofin, Lagos.
Copied Attention:
1
. His Excellency, Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu, Executive Governor, Lagos State
2. Rt Hon (Dr.) Mudashiru Ajayi Obasa, Speaker, Lagos State House of Assembly
Your Honourable
THE LINGERING INJUSTICE TO EGBE-IDIMU LCDA THE LAGOS ASSEMBLY AND STATE BOUNDARY COMMISSION NEED TO ADDRESS URGENTLY AT YOUR INITIATIVES
HOW THE COUNCIL IS LOSING A MODEST ESTIMATED SUM OF N6.6MILLION MONTHLY REVENUE TO THE NEIGBHOURING IGANDO/IKOTUN LCDA IN THIS RESOURSEFUL CORRIDOR ALONE
THE PREAMBLE
It may interest you to note that this open letter was first written to your immediate predecessor, Hon Kunle Sanyaolu Olowoopejo soon after his inauguration in 2021. But that was to be done as back-channel diplomacy engagement through a close circuit WhatsApp platform. This time, however, I have found it compelling to do same now as an open letter to you, given the understanding that the issue remains unaddressed, at least, to my knowledge so far as a concerned partisan progressive and resident of the local council. Doing this, I came forth as none state actor fully conscious that your governance is our collective responsibility in aims to move the Council in the direction of your great plans for the people.
The message is about the apparently unsettled “IPI Canal Boundary” our Egbe-Idimu LCDA shares with the North of Igando/Ikotun LCDA. To put it succinctly, it should be said by way of introduction that currently, Egbe-Idimu LCDA is suffering silently the injustice of asset striping occasioned by the mal-appropriation of its boundary delineation during the 2004 fractionalization of Alimosho Local Government into 6 administrative bodies of itself and five LCDAs. It should be so unfortunate to note here that no less than an estimated sum of N79.2Million (Seventy-Nine Million, Two Hundred Thousand Naira) is lost to this aberration annually. This is a colossal sum that may move mountains in miles for your prospect to deliver a Housing Estate in part of your cardinal project in view among your yearly developmental focus.
But the concern for the subject matter should deem to go beyond this revenue value. Like a volcano hill, boundary matters may look simple conjecturally. It is nevertheless a deadly tragedy when it erupts in the course of relationship between two communities. It may sound a doom day projection saying this here. But it is not necessarily anachronistic for one to see the feasibility. From the quest for creation of 20 more states by the National Assembly as yet subsisting today, no fewer than 40 deaths may be anticipated from boundary disputes to follow it. Of course, this is yet a modest realistic thinking when evaluated against the state of Nigeria nation in land and boundary matters at all time. Of course, it is quite indisputable that boundary matter is a land matter in itself.
Therefore, to reason out the gloom of fatality aforesaid about a prospect of boundary dispute in direct Arithmetic, it is to be realised that each of the new states will undergo boundary delineation along its four cardinal Poles – North, East, West and South. Based on this, boundary disputes would likely arise from a minimum of two poles. That literally projects about 40 disputes for anticipation at state level. Granted that each state acquires 5 local governments from the mother state, the local governments would thence want to be subjected to surgical divisions too. What should we expect from all this? A potential spontaneous eruption of multiple intra-state boundary disputes across the country. And as we know, many states in Nigeria are very sensitive to boundary issues with deadly emotions, especially in the Southeast geopolitics and at inter-geopolitical corridors.
But we can as well acknowledge the sophistication of Lagos State in matters like this. It is well blessed with capacity to curtail such grievous emotions. Thus so that when the matter of boundary dispute evolved between Igando/Ikotun and Egbe-Idimu LCDAs at the time of their creations, maturity prevailed in dousing tension. It was nevertheless resolved more by appeal to the emotion of
Awori brotherhood of then pioneer executive council chairmen – Hon Jimoh Ajao and Ashimiu Olorunfemi respectively. It remains same today though. But it is yet unfortunate that this path to the solution rather have Egbe-Idimu holding the short end of the stick because it denied her the true, right and real benefit of proper interpretation of the phrase – “By IPI Canal” – upon which the dispute originally arose from the texts of the boundary demarcation.
ANALYSING FACTS OF THE ISSUE
The place of dispute in question was and is yet the Southern Gate of the highly resourceful Ikotun Market by the former Albert Furniture that today turns the baking factory of Butterfield Bread – Pioneer Food Concept Ltd. In describing the boundary nexus between Igando/Ikotun and Egbe-Idimu around this corridor at creation, the text of their demarcation unambiguously expressed the ‘IPI Canal’ as the boundary feature. This alone exuded the creative ingenuity of those who did the demarcation.
Generally, boundary demarcation between two communities from the ancient era always follow existing natural land features like river, mountain, valley, hill and other historical physical monuments. The Modern feature to come later is the use of major road infrastructure, even though feeder road paths had also been applicable in the ancient time.
Interestingly to align with this, the IPI Canal is an historical river path that naturally settled the Igando/Ikotun in boundary from Egbe-Idimu LCDA in two significant poles of East and West. In its natural ancient epic before construction of the Ikotun-Egbe Highway, the River designated as ‘IPI Canal’ today made the boundary between Egbe and Igando at the bank upon which the fence of Food Concept Ltd stands today. This puts Egbe-Idimu on the East of the River and Igando-Ikotun on the West. See the Egbe-Idimu Streets Map extract above from Alimosho Streets Map (©ASM) drawn by Barlade Cartographers.
To use the Ikotun-Egbe Highway as the boundary feature around this axis, the ancient river that has shrieked to become the IPI Canal evidently runs its course from a long way of its source along the southern extremity of Egbe-Idimu LCDA, called
Agodo. Along this part, it makes the boundary demarcation with Isheri Osun community of Igando/Ikotun. See Agodo Streets Map below. The green bunch is the river/canal path
Curving out Northwards now, the ancient river separates the ancient community of
Ika-otan (turned Ikotun today) in its western side from
Oko Akehe that became Bolorunpelu today on its East side up to the fence of the IPI factory. It is to be noted that Bolorunpelu is the Southwest community of Egbe-Idimu LCDA. See the Bolorunpelu Streets Map sharing boundary with Ikotun.
Getting to the Ikotun-Egbe Road now, the river yet continues its course. But it appears to be divided into the North – being the Ikotun Market side – and the South – by the fence of IPI factory. The area of dispute is apparently on the Northern Boundary. Given this clear course of the river turned IPI Canal from this junction, it was so curious to the discerning minds at the incipient time that while the pioneer Jimoh Ajao’s Chairmanship of Igando/Ikotun LCDA was willing to accept the IPI Canal demarcation language for this side of Bolorunpelu/Ikotun boundary, he vehemently rejected the part for Igando-Egbe as if they were two distinct parts along the same river course. What an anomaly to conceive?
These blocks of lockup should belong to Egbe-Idimu LCDA
NOW TO ESTABLISH THE EGBE-IDIMU LCDA TERRITORY WITHIN IKOTUN MARKET
We may now return to the River course to trace the boundary path between the two local councils from this Ikotun/Egbe Highway, inward the Ikotun Market through to the perimeter premises of Igando/Ikotun Council Secretariat. It must however be done on same concept of historical boundary course of the river. Please take conscious note of the order of photos intertwining the text from here. Their numberings 3-7 tell the trailing of the ancient river now as the IPI Canal boundary demarcation to its terminal end, if any.
In a time of my interactions with important stakeholders, the consensus of fact I gathered from all concerned Obas and others that included the pioneer Chairman of Alimosho Local Government, was that the land upon which the Igando/Ikotun LCDA Secretariat and the Ikotun Market sit over was originally Igando land. The inference I intend to draw from this is that this is where the Egbe Kingdom of Egbe-Idimu LCDA shares its boundary with Igando Kingdom of the Igando/Ikotun LCDA. It is to be noted that this river (of IPI Canal) yet made their boundary feature from this point of Ikotun/Egbe Road.
From an interview with Alhaji Fatai Akinyemi by this writer as Coordinator of Project Alimosho Heritage (PAH) sometimes in 2018, Egbe was not made an important stakeholder in settling for the expansive piece of land on which the permanent site of Alimosho Local Government would sit as we found it today. This was because the big river (IPI Canal) path on the side of Albert Furniture clarified it to belong to Egbe, so it was not to be part of the Igando land being contemplated for the use. Egbe was on the Eastern part of the river. The incorporation of a motor park as Ikotun new Garage and the complementary Irepodun (Ikotun) market was also limited to the western bank of this river ‘IPI Canal’.
However, the progressive growth of the market, alongside with shrieking of the river, would later cause expansion of shop buildings and other market feature, crossing this IPI Canal to settle on the hilly side of Egbe territory as part of the market. But as this was to be so, there was no conscious fuse to be raised because it was one Alimosho Local Government progressively developing. Gracefully however, the river path could not be erased because it has become a Major drainage channel. The immediate photos above and below this paragraph show the river on its continuous course. The one below however points a yellow arrow to the second small bridge (like culvert) built across the river to link Egbe and Igando land in contemporary time.
So, when the Local Government was eventually divided into six by the 2004 Referendum exercise carried out by the administration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the body concerned with boundary demarcation consciously took notice of the IPI Canal as originating from a historical landmark to set the Central boundary between Igando/Ikotun and Egbe-Idimu LCDA.
Applying this fact, therefore, Egbe-Idimu LCDA territory automatically covers the Southern Gate of the Irepodun (Ikotun) Market on the East side of the small bridge to the single-storey block of lockups meshed with the fence of Butterfield Bread to the canal bank. Interestingly, this part of the market has ordinarily become the spot for Wet (agricultural produce) Market. In other words, this is one great and resourceful economic asset that has been stripped of Egbe-Idimu LCDA and it is high time your administration began the process of recovery earnestly in this early time of your tenure as a way of redressing the grave injustice. As human nature would have it, Igando/Ikotun now has what should be described as its own Wet Market around the bank of same IPI Canal shared with the Bolorunpelu side of Egbe.
But the encroachment of Igando/Ikotun LCDA into Egbe-Idimu territory is rather expensive, going by the route of IPI Canal river. Inward the Council Secretariat and right at the centre of the market, it is clear that all the new buildings in colour yellow on the right wing from the supposed deep gully portion of the ancient river known to exist at the base of small gate exit into the Secretariat from the market are standing on the Egbe-Idimu territory. See photo 6 below. It covers all the long storey blocks on the large portion of land therefrom, eastward back to the Wet Market and covering the quadrangle for refuse site. They should beging to consider paying rents to Egbe-Idimu LCDA in lieu of a prospect of outright forfeiture.
To make a wider sense of this issue is to say that besides this historical fact of the case, it is also morally wrong for Igando/Ikotun to solely own what should rightly be known as joint asset of both Councils from the old Alimosho by privilege of their joint territorial space of the Council secretariat and the market appurtenances. As a matter of fact, the estimated annual N79.2Million revenue loss to Egbe-Idimu does not factor in all that should becoming from the central part of the market. It came from the said Wet Market alone.
Should it be any surprise to conclude that Egbe-Idimu territory yet falls within the perimeter fencing covering the Council Secretariat. From the small gate of this perimeter making the exit to Ikotun Market, the right side inward the LAMATA corridor should seem to belong to Egbe-Idimu. This covers the Secretariat Central Mosque building, the block housing federal agencies like Population Census, et al, are supposed to be sitting on EGBE-Idimu LCDA lands. The fact of evidence cannot be farfetched when you trace and define the IPI Canal in the true sense of its writers' intention.
Mr Chairman sir, I do not think it would be out of place to reinstate a cause for genuine and final arbitration of the dispute before the Lagos State Boundary Commission and the State Assembly. It is quite appreciable that the Lagos progressives is one big family with good internal resolution of any matter and every matter desiring attention in quest for justice. This may be given the trial it worth. In doing so, however, you may need to make it holistic by raising all the grievance once and for all. I say this because the places where Egbe-Idimu is also shortchanged include its Northern Boundary shared with Alimosho Local Governmen. I hope to also acquaint you with our findings about this while on the job of drawing Egbe-Idimu Streets Map.
Yours Sincerely,
Razaq Adedeji Jimoh
CC:
Hon Kehinde Olaide Joseph, Member, Lagos State House of Assembly (Alimosho Constituency 02)
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