Olubadan: Don’t allow strangers mislead you, ex-Oyo AG tells Makinde

Michael Lana, former attorney-general of Oyo state, has asked Seyi Makinde, the state governor, not to allow strangers to mislead him on who becomes the next Olubadan of Ibadan.

Following the death of Saliu Adetunji on Sunday, Lekan Balogun, the current Otun Olubadan and most senior among the high chiefs is next in line to be crowned.

But in an earlier letter to Makinde, Lana claimed that Balogun and all the high chiefs who were crowned obas in 2017 by the late Abiola Ajimobi, the immediate past governor on the state, are unfit to be Olubadan.

He said since they are already kings courtesy of the crowns given to them by Ajimobi, it is traditionally wrong for them to aspire to be installed king again.

On Tuesday, K. Eleja, Wahab Egbewole and Adekunle Sobaloju, legal representatives of the high chiefs, faulted Lana’s letter to the governor. They said the content of the letter is not a true representation of the law and the facts on the ascension to the Olubadan stool.

While reacting to the lawyers position in another letter to the governor on Wednesday, Lana asked Makinde to be wary of advice from those who do not have knowledge of Ibadan chieftaincy laws.

“I urge your excellency not to allow strangers to mislead you in further desecrating our tradition and custom. Your excellency, as an Ibadan man, it behoves on you to get our tradition back,” he said.

Lana told Makinde in the letter that the lawyers’ claim that they represented the Olubadan-in-council could not be true because there was no formal process that employed them as the council’s representatives.

“I know as a fact that they are not solicitors to the Olubadan-in-Council, rather they are solicitors to the High Chiefs who were made Obas by your predecessor (Ajimobi) and it was in that capacity that they instituted Suit No.1/22/2020,” he said.

“I know as a fact, that High Chief Rashidi Ladoja is a bona fide member of the Olubadan-in-Council and at no time did that council meet to appoint the said solicitors, its counsel, to institute an action against High Chief Ladoja or respond to my letter.

“I am not like them, who are not from Oyo state, not to talk of being from Ibadan. Thus it is of no moment to them, if they mis-advise their clients to dig deeper into the grave of illegality. They therefore have no qualms if Ibadan burns.

“The question they failed to answer, is whether an Oba can again be elevated to an Oba. The position of Oba is final and does not require further elevation.”