Osun State Police Command has arrested five suspects in connection with the recently revived ethnic crisis between Ife and Modakeke towns in Osun State, which led to the death of five people in late August.

According to Wale Olokode, the state Commissioner of Police, the suspects are Akingbala Olakunle, Owoniyi Segun, Daramola Muideen, Shina Adeyemi and Awotinde Elijah.

Olokode noted that one double-barrel gun, five live cartridges, one knife, a cutlass and an axe were recovered from the suspects.

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“This unwarranted and barbaric murder provoked Modakeke indigenes and they decided to take revenge on the indigenes of Ife,” he said.

The police chief added that the suspects would be charged to court after investigation.

A few days after the bloody crisis on August 20, Enitan Adeyeye Ogunwusi, the Ooni of Ife, said the incident was not a resurgence of the Ife-Modakeke crisis. However, FIJ can confirm that the killing followed the pattern of the agelong ethnic crisis.

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At the moment, Ife indigenes are not able to travel to Toro and Alape villages in Modakeke.

“People are regularly being ambushed and killed along farm paths,” a motorcyclist in Ife told FIJ.

He also said the deaths were more than the number reported, as people had not been able to access some agrarian areas to establish the actual number of casualties.