After Daily Trust report, Ogun commissioner visits forest, uncovers illegal flyover

Less than a week after Daily Trust on Sunday published an investigative report on the activities of poachers in Ogun State forests, a government monitoring team, led by the Commissioner for Forestry, Tunji Akinosi, has uncovered an “illegal flyover bridge’’ in Omo Forest Reserve. The reserve, the largest in the state, covers 135,906 ha and […]

Less than a week after Daily Trust on Sunday published an investigative report on the activities of poachers in Ogun State forests, a government monitoring team, led by the Commissioner for Forestry, Tunji Akinosi, has uncovered an “illegal flyover bridge’’ in Omo Forest Reserve.

The reserve, the largest in the state, covers 135,906 ha and spreads across Ijebu East and North local government areas.

Akinosi, who led a monitoring team on Thursday to Laagan village, the site of the ongoing construction, described it as “unauthorised construction’’ and ordered its destruction within two weeks.

The three-page report by Daily Trust on Sunday, titled, ‘Despite prohibiting laws, poachers prey on Ogun forests as elephants migrate,’ revealed how poachers operated with little or no checks.

A statement made available to our correspondent yesterday by the press officer in the ministry, Soji Solarin, quoted the commissioner as saying, “The illegal flyover is being constructed by illegal loggers for easy transportation of the state’s forest resources to neighbouring states without approval.’’