The Lagos cult war that made ‘heads to roll’

Taiwo Jimoh

April 18, is a bloody day residents of Olokonlan and Ogombo communities, Abraham Adesanya, in Eti-Osa Local Government Area Lagos State, will never forget in a hurry.

On that day, the fragile peace, which had characterized the communities, shattered, leaving decapitated littering the streets.

On that day in question, a popular land speculator, Abdurasak alias Alfa Nla, was killed by suspected cult members.

According to residents, Alfa Nla, allegedly used to be cultist until he renounced the group and became somewhat godly, earning him the nickname, Alfa Nla.

After leaving the cult group, he started doing everything human possible to stop cultism and cultists from taking over communities under the Eti-Osa Local Government Area.

The killing of Alfa Nla shocked residents to their bone marrows. Before his death, Alfa Nla had team of youths under his wing. His untimely death caused them to be bitter and they later embarked on reprisal the following day.

Before residents knew what was happening, dead bodies and decapitated heads were everywhere. Panicked residents, who didn’t want to be caught in the cross-fire started moving out of both communities.

The once peaceful Olokonlan and Ogombo communities became mournful places following the protracted cult war.

The cult war was between Eiye and Aiye groups. Four people were beheaded and the heads were dumped at Abraham Adesanyan bus stop along Ajah Epe road, causing great panic.

It was learnt that since the clash of the cultists, petrified residents have started moving out of  the communities scared of being caught in the cross fire of the warring factions.

Alfa Nla was believed to have been killed by cultists from General Paint dump site, Olokonlan.

The murder of Alfa Nla triggered the crisis as his boys, who mourned him, carried out a reprisal.

A resident of the area, who spoke with our correspondent under the condition of anonymity, said: “We have been indoors since the killings started.”

He explained that the mayhem started on April 18, after Alfa Nla, a land speculator, was killed.

He explained that Alfa Nla was one of the people in the communities who had been fighting cultists and cultism.

The resident added: “There are shanties around those communities, where many foreigners, including Togolese live. These foreigners are mostly those involved in cultism. It is believed that those from the shanti communities killed Alfa Nla. He was killed after a minor issue. Since his murder, there has been no peace. Alfa Nla boys reinforced and had been fighting youths from the shanti communities.

“The following day after Alfa Nla, three persons were beheaded by rival group. The group is from Saudi community. Saudi community is another shanti community in Eti-Osa. In the reprisal that followed, someone was killed at Olokonla. Policemen came on Friday after one of the clashes, but later left. Right now, we are living in fear. We were all scared and locked ourselves indoors. Killings had been going on for long.”

Our correspondent, who went to these communities, gathered that the cultists, for reasons unknown, took to cutting off heads of their rival members during the clashes. Whenever they cut off a head, they would drop it beside the body.

“There a third victim, but he was not beheaded,” said another resident. “When people started moving out of the communities, some of us had nowhere to run to. We stayed behind. I have nowhere to run to. This is the only home some of us have. Three persons were killed in the community behind Lagos Business School. In that community, every form of crime you can think of, including robbery, takes place there.”

When the numbers of corpses were counted, they were five; the lives of five youths extinguished like candles in the wind. The heads and corpses were left at different parts of the communities.

When the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) in charge of Operations was alerted about the matter, he immediately radioed Area J Command and other policemen. He instructed them to move into the troubled communities and ensured the hostility was controlled. The police evacuated the corpses to mortuary.

The Baale of Ogombo Phase 2, Chief Lateef Ogunleye, said that he was still in shock after receiving the news of Alfa Nla’s murder.

Ogunleye said: “On the day he was killed, Alfa Nla called to inform me that someone wanted to build a house in our community. I was sleeping when he called and when I woke up, I saw his missed calls. I was trying to return the calls, when another call came in. The caller told me that Alfa Nla had been shot by some cultists.

“I told the person that called me that they should rush him to the hospital. I was told he died on the way to the hospital as a result of blood loses. I was also told that one Mike, who was trying to save Alfa Nla, was also injured by the cultists.”

Asked security measures which had been put in place in both communities following killing of Alfa Nla, Ogunleye, said: “We have the support of policemen from Ajuwe and Ogombo police station. We also have local vigilante men patrolling the community from 7p.m. to 10p.m. on daily basis.”

Speaking about hoodlums living in General Paint dumpsite, Ogunleye described them as dreadful and daring people.

The Baale said: “There was a time two of my generators were stolen. After much effort, it was traced to General Paint dump sire community. It took the intervention of the seriki of the Hausa, before the hoodlums brought out my generators.

“I heard from a good source that the hoodlums sell human parts, cocaine and other hard drugs. Instead of policemen to flush them out, they would rather go there to collect money from them. The hoodlums always claimed that the land was given to them by a white cap chief. The Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Zubairu Muazu, should beam his searchlight on that community.”

Exactly four days after the killing of Alfa Nla, soldiers stormed Olokonlan, went to one of the shanti communities around there and pulled them down.

The soldiers were said to have stormed the two communities on the order of the Landlords Association of Ogombo and Olokonla. The soldiers embarked on a demolition of some shanties, believed to be aboard of suspected criminals and cult members.

One of the inhabitants of the affected shanti building, Mrs. Mariam Adediran, said that the soldiers came into the community like thieves at night and pulled down their homes.

She said: “The soldiers came at about 12am. We were asleep. They woke us up and ordered to leave on our own accord or they would force us out. My husband and I were introduced into the community by a friend after he lost his job. When we got into the community, we built the house ourselves. We were still mourning Alfa Nla, when these soldiers came from nowhere. Right now, we don’t know where to start to pick the broken piece of our lives. They demolished houses and shops.”

After the soldiers were through with the first sets of shanties, they moved to another, also leaving sorrow and tears. Mrs. Comfort Oyedele, a victim of the second set of demolished shanties, said that she lost her shop and house. She cried that both makeshift buildings were pulled down without a notice from the soldiers.

She said: “I was in my shop around 4p.m when I saw about five soldiers patrolling the community. They asked us to leave. I asked the soldiers where they wanted us to go to. One of them told us that they were sent from Abuja to send those living in shanties out of the community, because we were the ones harbouring cultists. I don’t see why they should accuse us of harbouring hoodlums. I still don’t know why the cultists killed Alfa Nla. The deceased on the fateful day was with us when he saw some people wearing black shirts. They approached where he was sitting. He stood up and went to meet them. He actually wanted to know what they wanted. He didn’t know they came to kill him.

“Before we knew what was happening, they opened fire on him. When they realized that bullets were not penetrating him, they brought out machetes and started cutting him. He fell down.  We all scampered in different directions. It was after we returned that we received that he was dead.”

Following the bloodbath at Eti-Osa communities, the police, on April 19, launched an investigation and arrested Saheed Lateef and Julius Augulere. Police said both men were arrested for their alleged involvement in the cult clash that left five people dead in the Abraham Adesanya area of the state.

The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), a Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP), Bala Elkana, in a statement said that an axe with bloodstains was recovered from the suspects.

He alleged that the suspects had confessed to the crime. He also said that only four corpses were recovered.

His words: “On April 14, 2019, at about 8.45am, the Ogombo Police Station received a distress call that rival cults engaged in a supremacy clash along Abraham Adesanya, Lekki-Epe Expressway and four members of the Eiye Confraternity were killed by the Aiye Confraternity members. Two suspects, Saheed Lateef, (21) and Julius Augulere, (20), both members of the Aiye Confraternity were arrested in connection with the case and they confessed to the crime. One axe with blood stains was recovered from them. The four corpses were evacuated and deposited in a public mortuary for autopsy. All the corpses had machete cuts. One of the corpses had a severed head, but it was not taken away. The command has launched a manhunt for other fleeing cult members.”

Cultists are presently on the rampage and killing in every part of the state. Our investigation revealed that most cultists these days now display their conquests openly with tattoos signifying the number of lives they had taken during different operations. Many of them have an admirable mastering of different weapons.

These weapons are the tools they freely use in harassing, intimidating, burning, looting, killing and decimating not only members of their cult groups, but also helpless and hapless Nigerians.

The situation is so bad that each time these cultists strike; they leave in their trail, blood and anguish. Killings galore in areas like Ajegunle, Ajah, Mushin, Ojuelegba, Ikorodu, Lekki, Epe, Okokomaiko, among other have become the routine. Most times, the causes of their clashes are often battle for supremacy.

In July this year, four persons were killed and another four wounded when members of the Eiye confraternity numbering about 50, invaded Okoya, Ogungbe, Moshalashi and Aroworade streets, wielding dangerous weapons and destroying property of members of the communities at about 3am.

Also, Yusuf Onifade (24) was killed by suspected cultists on February 14, at Bariga area of the state. The grieving mother, Muibat Onifade (52) said that the boy was killed in the most gruesome manner.

She said: “My son was killed on Valentine Day, February 14.  I don’t know why God didn’t take my life and spared that of my son. With the death of Yusuf, my days are numbered. It is the death of my son that is going to kill me. I cannot cope without him beside me.”

The distraught mother said she had been pregnant and had 10 babies, but they all died. Refusing to give up on having children, she kept trying and finally had five children that survived. Yusuf was one of the latter children. Among her children, Yusuf found a firm place in her heart because he was “generous.”

According to her, Yusuf was lured out of their home by some friends, pumped full of tramadol and then taken to another venue, at Odo-Eran area of the community, where they attacked him with planks.

 “As the planks hit him from all directions, he repeatedly cried and begged them to spare his life because of his mother. But his attackers, like is common among cultists, refused to listen to his pleas.”

A notorious cultist, Ogunlaja Elijah (28), who has been on the wanted list of the Lagos State Police Command, following alleged killings of rival members and innocent persons in Lagos, recently said: “I feel sorry for the families of victims I have killed.”

Elijah said that he killed two persons last year. Elijah was arrested alongside two other suspected cultists, Yesuru Adesanya and Kunle Osnowo.

Elijah said: “I live in Oworoshoki area of Lagos. I was initiated into cultism in 2016 when I accompanied my friend to his father’s burial in Osun State. When we came back to Lagos, I started my cult gang. Sometimes last year, there was trouble and they shot one of my friends. Also in November last year, my cousin was killed during a clash with a rival gang. At the end of the clash, I killed two people. One of them was from Benue State. I shot him. When the police arrested me, I was charged to court but was released in March, 2019. Since my return from prison, I have been visiting the hospital to see my ailing mother. I feel sorry for the family of the people I have killed.”