Ogun State government, at the weekend, said it has arrested eight persons for unlawful encroachment into the government forest reserve area in the border between J1 and J3 in Ijebu-Igbo, Ijebu North Local Government Area of the state, where they allegedly killed an elephant.
State Commissioner for Forestry, Ayo Olubori, who disclosed this yesterday, said those people arrested committed the crime late on Thursday, August 8, 2013, when a man (name withheld) encroached the forest exclusively reserved for elephants in the state.
The commissioner said the seven other suspects were those who assisted the hunter in dismembering the elephant after it had been killed.
Olubori, who described the act as a "very serious offence", also added that it took the government officials a night in the jungle after a three hour journey before they could effect the arrest of the suspects.
"The suspected killer of the animal was arrested on the spot at about 1.00am after a-three hour journey into the forest reserve. The animal is endangered, we have them in limited number, if care is not taken they may go into extinction."
The commissioner said the state government took the action in order to avoid being sanctioned by wild life activists, the United Nations agency in charge of endangered species, among others.
Emphasising that the suspects would be charged to court hopefully by today, Olubori said reports of preliminary investigation conducted by the state government revealed that the hunter was sent by some prominent people in the society to get them elephant tusks at the price of N25 million per one.
He said the suspect has "confessed to the crime and he is on tape."
National Mirror
Killing an elephant is an offence in places like this especially when the elephant has an owner so I'm not surprised!