…Tell President Tinubu To Sack MD, BOA
Sam Philip
Farmers at Oluwa forest reserve in Odigbo Local Government Area of Ondo State on Sunday protested and caused traffic jams along Ore/Lagos Expressway over alleged plan by SAO Agro-allied Services Limited, to grade their cocoa plantations.
The farmers who said there’s a subsisting court order restraining the company and the state government from further grading of their farmlands pending the determination of the substantive suit.
Gathered at Nigerian Romanian Wood Industry(NIROWI) wood plantation junction along the Expressway, obstructed traffic flow, carrying placards with different inscriptions.
The farmers alleged that SAO Agro-Allied Services Ltd was owned by the Managing Director, Bank of Agriculture(BOA), Ayo Sotinrin, saying the company in connivance with the Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Agric and Agribusiness, Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola had attempted to invade their plantations and grade them.
The inscriptions on the placards include “We no go gree for SAO Company to grade our Cocoa,” Our Cocoa is our livelihood,” “Rotimi Wemimo Must Go,” among many others expressing their grievances.
They referred to the March 24, 2025 ruling in which Justice A. Adegoroye of Ore High Court, sitting in Ondo, had granted an interlocutory application of the farmers filed by their attorney, Tope Temokun Esq.
The court retrained all the respondents from further grading of the farmlands of the farmers.
Felix Adeniyi, one of the protesting farmers, said: “We are Ondo State farmers, government tenants farming in Oluwa Forest Reserve (OA3A), Odigbo, Odigbo Local Government Area of Ondo State.
“The government of Ondo State is collecting rent from us in millions of naira every year, even up till this current year, and under Governor Rotimi Akeredolu, these private companies came in multitude, scampering for the government forest reserves, claiming to have bought the forest reserve from the government.
“This was what led to our court case against the Ondo State Government and these private investors, among which is SAO Agro-Allied Services Limited, a private company owned by Mr. Ayo Sotinrin, the current Managing Director, Bank of Agric.
“Since the inception of the current regime of Governor Lucky Orimisan Aiyedatiwa, peace seemed to have been coming back, as the governor had met us severally and promised he would never allow us farmers to face any form of harassment or hostility in the hands of anybody.
“However, since the appointment of Mr. Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola, Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Agriculture and Agribusiness, who also doubles as the Chairman of the Ondo State Agribusiness Empowerment Centre (OSAEC), he has shown total hatred, hostility, and unfriendliness to the farmers in Ondo State and has been acting as if he were an SSA to the private companies struggling for the souls of our forest reserves, particularly SAO Agro-Allied Services Limited.
“Mr. Rotimi Wemimo had been threatening us with eviction from our farms, with threats of arrest and detention, claiming to be acting on the orders of the governor.
“On the 24th of March 2025, the High Court of Ondo State sitting in Ore, presided over by Honourable Justice Adegoroye, gave an order of injunction against the Ondo State Government and SAO Agro-Allied Services Limited, to henceforth stop further grading of our crops, and they were also restrained from evicting us till the final determination of the case in court.
“To our chagrin, on the 28th of April 2025, while our leaders, including Mr. Abayomi Isinleye, were lured to Akure for a supposed peace meeting by Mr. Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola, SAO Agro-Allied Services Limited drove its bulldozers into the farms to resume the destruction of our cocoa farms, under the pretext that it had purchased ten thousand hectares of the Ondo State Forest Reserve from the Ondo State Government, the same government that is collecting rents from us every year.
“These coordinated actions were carried out under the authority of Mr. Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola, presenting himself without pretense as the protector in Ondo State of the private business of Mr. Ayo Sotinrin, who ironically is the MD of Bank of Agric, a bank owned by the Federal Government and created to cater for both small-scale and large-scale farmers in terms of credit facilities and other support, but has turned his official powers to declare war against farmers in Ondo State, under the supervision of Mr. Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola.
“We are calling on Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa to remove Mr. Rotimi Wemimo as the Chairman of the Ondo State Agribusiness Empowerment Centre (OSAEC), as he is self-serving, an enemy of the farmers in Ondo State, and is not serving the interest of the government but that of private investors, for his own gains.
“We demand the immediate resignation of Mr. Ayo Sotinrin as the MD of Bank of Agriculture for conflict of interest, and we call on President Tinubu to remove Mr. Ayo Sotinrin if he refuses to resign.”
However, the SSA Agric and Agribusiness, Rotimi Wemimo Akinsola, could not be reached as at the time of filing this report.
Mr. Ayo Sotinrin, in reaction to the incident, said SAO Agro-Allied Services Limited didn’t dispossess the farmers their farmlands.
He disclosed that SAo Agro-Allied Services Limited had processed the land allocation, and paid all necessary fees, including obtaining a Certificate of Occupancy (C of O) from Ondo State government.
Sotinrin further explained that the firm had engaged the farmers, offering them compensation, and they were proposing to give them 3000 hectares of land to cultivate.
According to him, “We want to put the records straight. We are doing large-scale commercial agriculture, and we need to have our records very straight. Whatever land we want to use, we need to have a Certificate of Occupancy(C of O) issued by the government authorities on the land.
“When we accessed the land, the company encountered farmers who the state government said are occupying the land illegally.”
