The Osun State Police Command has arrested the state Commissioner for Environment, Hon. Mayowa Adejoorin, for allegedly masterminding a gun attack on members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) during the latest eruption of violence in the state ahead of Saturday’s off-cycle governorship election.
Three persons were hit by bullets identified as Tobi Ilesanmi, Wasiu Alanide and Aderemi Adedeji when men allegedly stormed an APC rally at Oke-Omiru in Ilesa and opened fire. The injured were rushed to Wesley Guild Teaching Hospital for treatment. An eyewitness, Kola Adeoti, said a 12-to-14-year-old boy, Oluwatobi Ilesanmi, was struck by a stray bullet in the thigh while at his mother’s shop nearby.
The Osun State Police Command, through its Public Relations Officer, DSP Abiodun Ojelabi, said the gunmen, allegedly led by Adejoorin, drove to the rally and opened fire, with some of his companions wearing Amotekun Corps uniform. The suspects fled the scene after the attack but were pursued by members of the public, resulting in the apprehension of some of the fleeing gunmen. Police said one of the suspected Amotekun personnel pulled a knife on his pursuers and attempted to stab them in a bid to escape.
Ojelabi said operatives of the Force Intelligence Department-Intelligence Response Team (FID-IRT), acting on information about the incident, mobilised to the area and sighted a Lexus vehicle with registration number ABJ-89TS. An individual identified as an Amotekun operative was found inside the vehicle, allegedly in possession of a pump-action firearm. The vehicle and its occupants were arrested and transferred to the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) for questioning.
Police said preliminary investigation identified one of the occupants as Adejoorin. Four expanded cartridges and an Amotekun cap were recovered at the scene. The Command also acknowledged allegations linking another individual, Hon. Wale Akerele, Chief Whip of the Osun State House of Assembly, to the incident, but stressed that the claim remained under investigation, adding: “No individual should be presumed guilty until the investigation establishes otherwise.”
Akerele disputed the APC’s version of events, saying he was driving along Isokun road when he encountered the APC rally and its members began shooting into the air. He said his Amotekun security detail, who were with him in the vehicle, also shot into the air to scare the crowd before he left the scene. He said he was later invited by the Divisional Police Officer over allegations that he shot at APC members and honoured the invitation to state his own side of the story. He said that on his way back from the police station, he again ran into the APC crowd, who he said were “prepared to attack” him, prompting his Amotekun detail to act in his defence. “There is no way that I will drive and still be shooting,” he said, adding that a member of the APC had told others present not to blame him.
The APC Campaign Council accused Akerele of masterminding an “unprovoked and violent attack” on its peaceful campaign rally. The council’s Head of Media and Publicity, Engr Omowaiye Oluremi, said members were holding a peaceful procession in Ilesa West when Akerele, accompanied by armed Amotekun personnel, opened direct fire on the crowd, injuring several people, including 12-year-old Oluwatobi Ilesanmi. The council called on the Nigeria Police Force and other security agencies to immediately arrest and investigate Akerele and the Amotekun operatives involved, describing the incident as part of a continuous pattern of violence by “the ruling party.”
A party member identified only as Segun told reporters that APC supporters were on their way back from an early morning rally when they were ambushed by men led by a state lawmaker, who first shot into the air before firing into the crowd when some supporters refused to flee. He said a truck driver and passers-by were also hit by the gunfire.
Reacting to Adejoorin’s arrest, Governor Ademola Adeleke’s campaign team, the Imole Campaign Council, described it as a plot to silence Accord Party leaders in the state. The council’s spokesman, Pelumi Olajengbesi, addressing newsmen at the Imole Media Centre in Osogbo, described the manner of the arrest as “nothing short of a bandit-line abduction carried out under the cover of police authority.”
Olajengbesi called on the Inspector-General of Police, Tunji Disu, to rein in the Osun Police Command and, in particular, the state Commissioner of Police, Ibrahim Gothan. He alleged a disturbing pattern in which prominent Accord leaders and supporters in Ijesaland were being picked up by police on allegations he described as politically motivated, removing them from the campaign field at a critical period. He said the council was concerned the arrests may be linked to an attempt to create conditions for electoral manipulation in Ijesaland ahead of the poll, and demanded Adejoorin’s immediate release, insisting there was no lawful basis for his detention.
Separately, the Accord Party accused the leadership of the APC in the state of importing and harbouring election result hackers at a hotel in Osogbo. The party’s State Chairman, Victor Akande, alleged the hackers were brought in from Lagos and Abuja and had set up an operational centre at the hotel, with a target of compromising the INEC electronic system to input fake results, and called on INEC to be on its guard.
APC spokesman Kola Olabisi dismissed the claim as false and baseless, saying the party had no need to rig the election as it enjoyed majority electorate support. He warned the Accord Party against “frivolous claims,” saying fear of defeat was responsible for the allegation, and challenged the party to report the matter to police if it had credible evidence.
Fresh fears of further violence have gripped Osun State ahead of the poll, with the APC and Accord Party jointly claiming to have lost a combined 18 members in the build-up to the election — a toll that has not been independently verified as a single figure. According to the Kimpact Development Initiative, 44 election-related violent incidents resulting in 13 fatalities were recorded in Osun between October 2025 and June 2026.
The APC Campaign Council, through Kehinde Ayantunji, alleged that no fewer than 10 of its members had been killed since the campaign began, in Ilesa, Iwo, Osogbo, Ijebu-Jesa and other communities. The Accord Party’s Media Director, Oladele Bamiji, said his party had lost about eight people to violence in Oriade, Ijebu-Jesha, Ilobu, Ikire and Osogbo.
Other recorded incidents include the killing of Accord Party member Kolade Eluyera in Irewole Local Government Area in May, which the party attributed to alleged APC supporters a claim the APC rejected; the June 3 shooting of Accord’s Osogbo Local Government chairman, Asimiyu Ajibola, who survived and was hospitalised; and the killing of Accord supporter Ajayi Rogba in Esa-Oke, which APC members in the area denied involvement in.
The state has been billed for the deployment of 15,000 policemen across its roughly 3,761 to 4,000 polling units, a figure that has generated divergent reactions. Ayantunji of the APC said the number of personnel mattered less than their professionalism, equipment and capacity to protect the vote. Bamiji of Accord questioned whether the numbers were adequate given the scale of violence recorded and the number of polling units, comparing the deployment unfavourably to smaller states like Ekiti.
A coalition of civil society groups, the Osun Masterminds, criticised the deployment as amounting to militarisation of the election. Its spokesperson, Ayo Ologunde, warned that a heavy police presence could create fear and voter apathy, generate illegal checkpoints, and leave neighbouring states vulnerable to crime due to reduced police presence there, while questioning the cost of the deployment against alternative uses for the funds.
Conversely, the Convener of Dialogue 365, Saka Waheed, backed the deployment as necessary to prevent further killings and ensure a peaceful election, saying the figure could even be higher. A former chairman of the House Committee on Information, Olatunbosun Oyintiloye, also supported the deployment, suggesting it may be driven by federal intelligence, while cautioning that concerns over extrajudicial killings remain and urging security agencies to act decisively.
In a related development, the African Democratic Congress (ADC) constituted a 73-member Election Management Council to coordinate its activities ahead of the poll, led by former Cross River State Governor Liyel Imoke, with former House of Representatives Speaker Aminu Tambuwal as chairman, and Emeka Ihedioha and General Kabiru Nadama (rtd) as co-chairmen. The ADC’s National Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi, said the council would coordinate campaign activities including mobilisation ahead of the party’s final rally at Nelson Mandela Freedom Park, Osogbo.
