Iskilu Wakili: Detained OPC Members Released After Three Months

The Chief Magistrate Court in Ibadan has ordered the release of three members of the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), three months after their detention by the Oyo State Police Command.

The OPC members – Awodele Adedigba, Dauda Kazeem and Hassan Ramon – had been detained in mid-March 2021 after they arrested a suspected criminal reportedly from the Fulani ethnic stock, Iskilu Wakili.

The OPC had handed over Wakili to the Oyo State Police Command but the police subsequently detained three OPC members for allegedly burning down Wakili’s house and killing an unknown woman in the process.

However, the OPC and one of its leaders, Gani Adams, had said the murder and arson allegations were false, adding that it immediately handed over Wakili and three of his accomplices to the police in Igboora after their arrest.

The three detainees on Tuesday appeared before the magistrates’ court, presided over by A.O. Amzat, and were discharged and acquitted after the state’s Directorate of Public Prosecutions failed to prove to the court that the OPC men were guilty as charged.

Counsel for the defendants, Akwarandu Adetoun, said that the magistrate struck out the case and ordered the release of the detainees.