Yoruba elder warns of attacks in south-west, says terrorists have ‘easy access’

Banji Akintoye, leader of Ilana Omo Oodua, says the south-west is at risk of attacks by bandits and terrorists.

He said major infrastructure and places of worship will be targeted if the region is infiltrated by terrorists.

Akintoye, former president of the Yoruba World Congress (YWC), called on south-west governors to take proactive measures in averting potential attacks.

In a statement released through Maxwell Adeleye, his media aide, he called on religious leaders like Enoch Adeboye, general overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), to tighten security around their premises.

The statement read in part: “A combination of terrorists, Boko Haram and ISIS, have occupied Niger state, which is immediately north of Yorubaland, thereby providing for themselves very easy access into Yorubaland through the Yoruba parts of Kwara and Kogi states.

“Our situation has thus become desperate and requires desperate actions from our state governors. I feel obliged to devote much attention to the study of our Yoruba nation’s vicissitudes in these terrible times and from such studies, I am hereby raising an informed alarm to the governors of our states.

“I humbly and passionately urge our governors to come together to give the needed response to the danger that threatens to engulf Yorubaland in, most probably, the next few days.

“It is very well known that the signature action of these foreign terrorist organisations is to first destroy prominent assets of the society that they attack. That could mean that major public and private buildings in Lagos and Ibadan, particularly the hugely symbolic Cocoa House in Ibadan, would be their immediate targets.”

“Owners and custodians of significant edifices in Yorubaland are strongly advised to establish formidable security for their edifices. These include bridges, important public and private buildings, churches and such eminent church estates as the Redeemed, Winners, Deeper Life, Mountain of Fire Church camps and the unique Synagogue building of the Synagogue Church of All Nations, and even our most prestigious central mosque buildings in Lagos, Ibadan and our other cities.”

TheCable cannot independently verify the claims of potential attacks made by the former senator in the second republic.