Police Arrest FEDPOFA Students Over Cultism

By Oluwapelumi Fasoyin

The Kwara State Commissioner of Police, Mr Aminu Saleh, said the police had last Tuesday arrested the Vice President of the Federal Polytechnic Offa Students’ Union Government.

The police commissioner said the VP, Tajudeen Selim, was arrested for alleged involvement in cultism in Offa Poly, in the Offa Local Government Area of Kwara State.

He added that other students of the institution – Temitope Omotosho, Adewusi Vincent – an ex-student of Kwara State Polytechnic, Ilorin, Olanipekun Abimbola, and another suspect, Ayomide Ololade, were arrested for alleged involvement in cultism.

Saleh spoke through the command’s Police Public Relations Officer, Mr Ajayi Okasanmi, while parading the suspects in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital.

He lamented that despite the alarm the police raised on the plans by cultists to mark the cultism day on Saturday, the suspects ignored the warning and were initiating new members of the Aiye Confraternity when the police apprehended them.

He said, “These cultists from the Federal Polytechnic Offa blatantly refused to heed our warning and were rounded up by the Anti-Cultism Unit of the State Criminal Intelligence and Investigation Department, during the process of initiating new members in preparation for an attack”.

The CP identified the new initiates as Akinsebikan George and Gbolahan Ogunleye, adding that the red and white regalia of Aiye Confraternity, razor blade, calabash and one live cartridge were recovered from the suspects.

But Selim, who is a HND year-two student in the Department of Quantity Surveying, said he was not a cultist, claiming that he had gone to settle some issues among the arrested suspects when the police nabbed him too.

He said, “Someone came here to accuse us that we are cultists. Since I became the Vice President of the Offa Polytechnic Students’ Union Government, I have not recorded any cult clash. I have always been there to settle any problem that could arise. If there is any fraca in the school, the SUG would direct me to intervene. That is the reason why I was there.

“I was there the day they arrested the suspected cultists on behalf of the union so that there will be peace on our campus”.

The CP said the suspects would be charged to court.