• 70 per cent of youths in estate are cultists, say Police
Residents of Mile 2 Estate, in the Amuwo-Odofin area of Lagos State, are worried for their safety following the death of three persons in a cult war that lasted between Saturday, January 4 and Monday, January 6, 2025.
Trouble started after a fracas broke out among Eiye, Aye and Buccaneer cult members during the yearly carnival in the area.
It was reported that the situation became more intense when an Aye member, identified as Emma, was shot by suspected Eiye cult members.
It was learnt that four persons have been killed because of the incident.
A resident told The Guardian that the cultists are allegedly children of landlords in the area lamenting that their parents have failed to hand them over to the police despite repeated pleas.
According to the resident, the boys often threaten the peace of the area and go into hiding after committing heinous acts.
A barber, who simply identified himself as Atlas, said the misunderstanding started at the carnival held in the area and degenerated after a boy called Emma was killed, who was his customer.
According to him, the boys came to his shop on motorcycles with guns, cutlasses and other dangerous weapons after Emma was murdered, and challenged him that he belongs to a rival cult group.
“I stood my ground that I do not belong to any cult group, they insisted that I am a member of the black axe but I insisted that I do not belong to any group and they left me after minutes of interrogation.
“As a barber, I attend to different persons and they started calling me a cultist, but I am not, I can’t refuse to barb anyone or be restricted to barbing a group of people.
“The landlords in this estate need to do something about cultism. The children of most of the landlords are involved in cultism, this is not an external work. “I am scared for my life, I am tired,” he said.
Atlas called on the government to eradicate cultism because many people are being killed, and the younger ones are following in their footsteps.
“Cultism used to be on campus but now they are rampant in our neighbourhood. We won’t mind if they are killing themselves but they are killing innocent people.
“The police will only raid innocent persons to get money and leave the real cultists. Police told us that they would patrol on Tuesday, but we didn’t see any police. They need to fish out the cultists for peace to reign,” he added.
A landlord who pleaded anonymity said trouble started when the Eiye confraternity group came to the carnival venue with new faces and the Aye were not pleased with it.
He added that when the Eiye were on their way out, the Aye became hostile and they decided to confront them.
According to him, during the chaos, they injured some Aye members, on Sunday, the Aye traced the Eiye members to their location and destroyed the place. Four persons have been killed but the number could be more.
When asked what the landlords are doing on the matter, he said: “Most of these guys are children of landlords and now they have gone into hiding. We need the government’s support to end this menace. We are living in fear, people now go home early because of the issue.
When The Guardian reached out to the Divisional Police Office (DPO), Balogun Gboyega, he said: “We are patrolling the place. This is a cult-related issue but it’s more dangerous because the cultists are insiders. It would have been a different case if another cultist group came to attack a rival group from outside.”
“These cultists stay beside each other, they know their parents, and they grow up together so, it’s easy for one person to sneak and go to another room to kill an opponent.
“I called the estate president and the Chairman of Amuwo-Odofin Council was here on Tuesday. They should call a meeting and see how the matter will end. We arrested 28 of them and some of them are still on the run.”
When asked about the number of casualties, he said: “Three of them were killed. The first person was murdered at about 8:00 p.m., on Saturday and they didn’t inform the police because we would have stationed men in the area.
“They came to the station at about 1:00 a.m., to ask for a police report, while they were here at the station, the cult group struck, and they called us in the morning that they found two more bodies.
“When I resumed as the DPO, I realised that the estate was porous, and asked them to repair one of my vehicles and that I would give them five men to patrol the estate but they declined.
“70 per cent of the youths in the estate are cultists, hence I warned them against holding any carnival but they went outside to do the carnival before coming into the estate. We have the names of the organisers and they are on the run.” (Guardian)
