Elders protest invasion of ancestral land in Delta

Hundreds of elderly men and women of the Emu Ebendo community, along the Kwale/Ughelli Expressway, Ndokwa West council of Delta State took to the streets, protesting against what they called “forceful entry of Axxella company onto their ancestral land.” Although the protest was peaceful, the activities of the protesters paralysed businesses for a while as the community youths joined the elderly people to drive home their demands.

The protesters carried play cards with various inscriptions such as: “Emu Ebendo is a peaceful community, we are saying no to Axxella operations on our land, Axxella can not take our land from us by force, Axxella must go, we do not need you on our land, Axxella, we can not be intimidated, leave our land”, among others. The protest lasted hours amid the presence of Military personnel around the “encroached” land.

Addressing Journalists, one of the leaders of the community, Chief Eni Augustine Enum, lamented the sudden taking over of their land but vowed to resist the grabbers because “we don’t let go what is ours when it comes to Land”. “This land known as Oluji has been our land, we have been working peacefully on it until when a community we brought in called Obodogna came to see that there is oil in this place. “But, this community, which had been under us, challenged the ownership of the land while our people challenged them legally until we got judgement at the Supreme Court.”

According to him, Axxella erroneously bought the land from unauthorized persons and brought a bulldozer to the land with military support, but “we quickly reacted by coming peacefully too to reach out to all the people that matters to advise Axxella to leave the land without further delay.” The spokesperson of the community, Agbanishi Josiah, however, expressed disappointment over the way and manner Axxella company forcefully entered the land, “but we will not allow it because Axxella can not come with infiltrators and take over our land, never.” The Chairman, Community Development Committee (CDC) Sunday Chukwuka and the immediate past secretary advised Axxella company to do the needful if the company is really interested in doing business in the community. Efforts to reach the spokesperson of Axxella company, Omolara Gaslink, failed as calls and text messages were not responded to as of press time.

Source: https://guardian.ng/news/elders-protest-invasion-of-ancestral-land-in-delta/

Date: 11MAR25