There was palpable tension between residents of Ile-Ife and Modakeke of Osun State on Friday, following the killing of five farmers from Modakeke along Toro Road in the early hours of the day.
The five victims, all male, were found dead on the road to Toro village, where they reportedly had farms.
A community leader in Modakeke, Mr Femi Eluyinka, who confirmed the incident in an interview with our correspondent, said some people from the town, accompanied by police operatives, evacuated the corpses.
Eluyinka, who said the incident had aggravated tension in Modakeke town, said, “Policemen operatives have arrived; tension is on the rise; five of them (deceased) were indigenes of Modakeke and they were killed this morning along Toro road. They were heading to their farm.”
He further explained that personal details of the victims would be released by the police, adding that shops and business places hurriedly shut down as panic spread across the town after the incident.
When contacted, the spokesperson for the Osun State Police Command, Yemisi Opalola, said, “We heard some people were killed and the Commissioner of Police has deployed more policemen into the area.”
The remains of the victims, it was learnt, were later taken to the morgue of Obafemi Awolowo University Teaching Hospital, Ile-Ife.
However, while motorcyclists that accompanied the corpses, conveyed in a police van to the morgue, were returning to Modakeke through Enuwa, Ile-Ife, sources said there was an attempt to attack Ooni’s palace.
An eyewitness, who preferred anonymity, said some youths from Ife who had mobilised and waited at the entrance of the palace, repelled them and arrested some of the youths, as well as some of their motorcycles.
The Osun State Commissioner of Police, Olawale Olokode, on Friday, met some Ile-Ife chiefs, as the command intensified efforts to dispel tension caused by the killing of five Modakeke indigenes by unknown assailants.
“Government enjoins all citizens to be peaceful and to be law-abiding as all efforts shall be made to protect them and their property.”
