The Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Saliu Akanmu Adetunji, Aje Ogungunniso I, has said a statement credited to High Chief Owolabi Olakulehin that the Osi Olubadan, High Chief Rashidi Ladoja, was misleading him is rude and reckless.
The monarch said someone who will make him recognise “illegal crowns and cheap royalties” had not been born.
Oba Adetunji spoke yesterday in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, while welcoming to his palace members of Mesiogo Movement, a socio-cultural club of Ibadan indigenes who complained about the alleged disparaging statement of High Chief Olakulehin in a newspaper last Sunday.
The monarch, who hailed the youths, noted that a peaceful resolution on Ibadan chieftaincy dispute should centre around the Oyo State High Court judgment delivered by Justice Olajumoke Aiki, which declared the review as unconstitutional and illegal.
He stressed that while the embattled high chiefs were begging for “the rule of self-help, we are asking for the rule of law”.
Oba Adetunjis aid decorum is a characteristic of serving and ex-service men but regretted that “despite his military background, the fellow called Olakulehin has not been displaying discipline expected of his high office”.
He added: “Balogun Olakulehin remains the most troublesome and verbally reckless member of the Olubadan-in-Council till date with unenviable records of quarrels with High Chief Amidu Ajibade, the late High Chief Femi Olaifa, the Iyalode of Ibadan, High Chief Aminat Abiodun and now High Chief Rasidi Ladoja. In the same interview, he insulted the Ekerin Olubadan, High Chief Biodun Kola-Daisi.”
The first-class monarch said he was not surprised that Olakulehin supplanted the Otun Olubadan, High Chief Lekan Balogun, in the same crown-wearing camp to assume the leadership of the group without regard for seniority.
He said: “At over 80, do we need to tell Balogun Olakulehin that you can make your point without insulting your elders?”
Oba Adetunji, who warned the crown-wearing baales not to use the Ibadan Traditional Council crisis to illegally install chiefs without the consent of the Olubadan, added that every illegality committed today would be taken up and dealt with according to the law someday.
