The Yoruba Nation agitator,Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho, has recounted how he evaded arrest during the July 2021 raid on his Ibadan residence by operatives of the Department of State Services, saying the security team searched the house but failed to locate him.
Sunday Igboho claimed the operatives mistakenly believed a cat was him and killed the animal. He also alleged that they brought in what he described as a “fake herbalist” to perform rituals in a bid to track him down.
The Punch reported that Igboho made the revelations on Monday while receiving Muslim delegations at his residence in Ibadan. According to him, although the operatives surrounded and entered the property, he remained inside the house throughout the operation without being discovered.
“When they came around 1:30 am. I heard a sound and was inquiring who it was; they started shooting at the room. They heard my voice. When they finally scaled the fence in, they planted a dynamite on the burglary, and everything completely fell apart. That was where they entered. I was naked, but upon hearing their voice, I wore a jean and shirt. One mind was telling me to surrender to them; the other was telling me not to surrender, else I would be killed.
“So at a point, it was looking like I was scared of them; then I immediately yelled, inquiring what had happened and why they had come to pick me up. So they started shooting at close range without even seeing me.
“When they entered and were screaming that I opened the door, they pointed a gun at Dudu (my personal assistant)’s head. And he kept begging me not to shoot while knocking on the door. There, I suspected. They forced the door open. People were even lying that they shot me and I ran away with my intestines out.”
Responding to longstanding rumours that he transformed into a cat to escape, Igboho dismissed the claim, insisting that no such thing happened.
“I didn’t turn into a cat. They even killed it, thinking it was me. They even brought a fake herbalist who was just making an incantation and performing a ritual. I was in the house watching them, but they didn’t see me.
“There was this my brother who was partially blind and came out; upon sighting him, they shot him, thinking that he wanted to attack them. They took the corpses away as evidence that they truly invaded my home. So it was God that saved me after a prayer that some Muslim clerics did in my house, forestalling a bad vision they claimed to have seen on me.”
The DSS stormed Igboho’s residence in the Soka area of Ibadan, Oyo State, in the early hours of July 1, 2021, following months of escalating tension between the activist and the administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari.
Before the raid, Igboho had attracted nationwide attention after issuing an ultimatum to some Fulani residents in parts of Oyo State, accusing them of involvement in kidnappings and other violent crimes. He later intensified his campaign for the creation of an independent Yoruba Nation, insisting that criminal elements among the Fulani should be driven out of the South-West.
The Federal Government considered some of his activities a threat to national security, prompting efforts to arrest him.
Following the operation, the DSS announced that it recovered firearms and ammunition from the residence and arrested 13 of Igboho’s associates. The agency also said two of his aides were killed during what it described as an exchange of gunfire.
Igboho subsequently fled Nigeria and was later arrested in Cotonou, Benin Republic, while attempting to travel to Germany.
After spending several months in detention and legal proceedings, he was released by the Beninese authorities and has since remained in self-imposed exile in the Benin Republic, where he continues to advocate for the Yoruba Nation cause.
