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Anxiety As Owan Forest Communities Drag Edo State Government To ECOWAS Court

Published

3 years ago

May 16, 2022

Editor

Our Reporter

There is intense uneasiness and tongue-wagging around Edo State, as the state government has been dragged to the Community Court of Justice Economic Communities of West African States (ECOWAS), Abuja, by over 45 forested and agrarian communities of the Owan Forest Zone of the state, spreading across its four local government areas of Ovia North East, Uhunmwode, Owan West and Owan East.

The suit, reference no:ECW /CCJ/APP/22/22, was filed on 11 May, 2022, by its First Plaintiff, the Incorporated Trustees of the Okpamakhin Community Initiative, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), comprising farmers and other land users, drawn from the cluster communities (clans) of Irhue, Ozalla, Ora, Iuleha, Sobe and others.

The Second Plaintiffs are eight men and women, who are farmers and other land users of the forest zone.

The suit was filed by the communities’ lawyer on the matter, President Aigbokhan, Esq., with his legal team.

Aigbokhan, a Benin-based Freedom of Information (FOI) protagonist and human rights lawyer, had recently won a major suit at the same ECOWAS Court, against Edo State Government, with thousands of US Dollars damages to the petitioners.

By the ECOWAS Court’s suit, the ranging disputes on the forest zone, between the state government and the communities, also called Okpamakhin, seems to have come to a climax.

Over a year ago, the state governor, Mr. Obaseki, in conjunction with Mr. Godwin Emefiele, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, inaugurated a N69 billion fund for establishment of oil palm plantations in the state, bringing forward some foreign and local private companies and local growers of oil palm as beneficiaries.

Governor Obaseki told newsmen that he had earmarked tens of thousands of the state’s forest reserve estate for the project, which continued to be under disputes.

The statutory Defendant in the suit is the Federal Republic of Nigeria (FRN), who stands in for state governments on such matters as with the ECOWAS Court, pursuant to the FRN’s being a founding member state of ECOWAS, subject to the jurisdiction of the Honourable Court and loyalty of FRN to the various charters and protocols of the United Nations, African and ECOWAS, as well as Nigeria’s local laws and regulations.

In the suit, the first and second plaintiffs prayed the regional Court to amongst other things, protect their inalienable rights and get judgment against the Governor Godwin Obaseki-led government, who had ceded their communities’ vast ancestral forest reserves to private investors, to establish oil palm plantations and other agricultural activities, without their due information, consultation and consent.

Some of the Plaintiffs’ claims, which they also want the Court to stop, are the forceful takeover of their ancestral land by the State Government, with undue harassment of the communities and the locals by heavily armed policemen, stating that the land within the two forest reserves of Owan BC 10 Forest Reserve and Iuleha/Ora/Ozalla, that form a larger part of the Owan Forest Zone, is the communities mainstay, that were acquired by the British Colonial Government, who was duly accountable to their local communities, owners of the land, whereas the present state government, who the land was simply handed to should not act to the contrary

Headline

42 Killed In Israeli Attacks, Says Gaza’s Civil Defense

Published

14 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Gaza’s civil defence agency reported at least 42 people killed in Israeli attacks on Sunday, as the Israeli army prepared for a new assault on the Palestinian territory’s largest city.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said there had been several air strikes around Gaza City — which the military is gearing up to capture — including one in the Al-Sabra neighbourhood that killed eight people.

Attacks were also reported elsewhere across the territory, he said, with the “total tally currently rising to 42 dead”.

The army did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the figure.

“The situation is extremely dangerous… Each day, each minute, there are bombings, martyrs, death and blood — we can’t take it anymore,” Al-Sabra resident Ibrahim Al-Shurafa told AFP, explaining strikes and shelling were ongoing.

“We don’t know where to go. Death follows us everywhere,” he added.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency or the Israeli military.

The October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel’s offensive has killed at least 62,686 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

AFP

Headline

Venezuela Frees Eight Opposition Leaders

Published

14 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Venezuelan authorities released eight opposition leaders from jail early Sunday, including a former congressman and two Italian citizens, and granted house arrest to five others, an opposition politician said.

Most of those released had been charged with corruption in opposition-run mayoral offices.

Also set free was Congressman, Amirico de Grazia, detained amid protests that erupted during President Nicolas Maduro’s reelection in 2024.

“Today, several families are once again embracing their loved ones. We know there are many left, and we have not forgotten them; we continue to fight for everyone,” two-time former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles said on X.

Opposition leaders Victor Jurado, Simon Vargas, Arelis Ojeda Escalante, Mayra Castro, Diana Berrio, Gorka Carnevalli, as well as Italian nationals Margarita Assenzo and de Grazia were released, Capriles said.

Nabil Maalouf, Valentin Gutierrez Pineda, Rafael Ramirez, Pedro Guanipa, and David Barroso were placed under house arrest.

The Italian government confirmed the release of de Grazia and Assenzo, who must appear in court to clarify the conditions of their release. It also vowed to continue working on securing the release of other detained Italians.

“We have always said, and we maintain it: we will talk to whomever we need to talk to so that there is not a single political prisoner in our Venezuela!” Capriles added.

AFP

Headline

Russia, Ukraine Exchange Prisoners Of War, Civilians

Published

14 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Russia and Ukraine each sent back more prisoners of war on Sunday in the latest in a series of exchanges that have seen hundreds of POWs released this year, the two sides said.

Large-scale prisoner exchanges were the only tangible result of three rounds of talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul between May and July.

They remain one of the few areas of cooperation between the two countries since Russia’s offensive began in 2022.

“On August 24, 146 Russian servicemen were returned from the territory controlled” by Kyiv, the Russian defence ministry said on Telegram.

“In exchange, 146 prisoners of war of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were transferred” to Ukraine, it added. Ukraine did not confirm any figures for the release.

Russia also said that “eight citizens of the Russian Federation—residents of the Kursk region, illegally detained” by Kyiv were also returned.

Ukrainian forces launched a surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk region in August last year, seizing hundreds of square kilometres (miles) of territory in a major setback for the Kremlin.

Russia deployed thousands of troops from its ally North Korea as part of a counterattack but did not fully reclaim the region until April.

Among the Ukrainians released on Sunday was journalist Dmytro Khyliuk, President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Khyliuk was kidnapped in the Kyiv region in March 2022. He is finally home in Ukraine,” Zelensky said on social media.

Also freed was former Kherson mayor Volodymyr Mykolayenko, “who spent more than three years in captivity,” Zelensky’s aide Andriy Yermak wrote on X.

“In 2022, he was on the list for return, but Volodymyr voluntarily refused to be exchanged in favour of a seriously ill prisoner with whom he was sharing a cell in a Russian prison,” Yermak said.

AFP