Authorities of the Kwara State Polytechnic, Ilorin have appealed to the state government to embark on immediate construction of perimeter fence around the 4,500 hectares of land allocated to the school since 1973.

The school said this had become necessary to save the land from being taken over by land encroachers.

Speaking with journalists in Ilorin on Friday, the Director of Students Services of the institution, Abubakar Aremu, said over 1,000 hectares out of the 4,500 hectares had been taken over by encroachers.

Aremu, a surveyor, said the construction of development projects and infrastructures had been affected by the activities of land encroachers.

He said threats, intimidation and litigation by the villagers had become a stumbling block against the plan of the school to establish a school of agriculture.

He also said the encroachment had robbed the school of getting accreditation of courses as Agricultural Technology and Agricultural Engineering.

“The absence of adequate land space for the courses would be detrimental to the much-needed accreditation when the accreditation committee comes back to see that we don’t have the land ready,” he said.

Aremu, who said that he had been involved in the management of the institution’s land since 2013, said a total space of 5,400 hectares was acquired for the school in 1973 when it was established by the military administration of Colonel David Bamgboye.

He said a total number of 122 families were adequately compensated as of July 6, 1974, and advised to move out of the land.

He said, “After the payment of compensation to the original land owners, which varied according to the land space acquired by the state government, 49 villages were advised to move to different locations specified by the government.

“Unfortunately many of the villagers refused to move out of the land even after collecting the compensation. About a total of 49 villages. The families were also merged and asked to move to form a bigger village. Specific metres were allocated to them. Rather, they stayed put where they were. However, caretakers of the land are actually the problem now. Some of the people who relocated to some adjourning villages later came back to farm on the polytechnic land after collecting compensation.”