Ilorin Amusement Park: Toyin Saraki threatens legal action against KWSG, APC over alleged libel

By Adebayo Olodan

The wife of former Senate President, Mrs Toyin Saraki has threatened legal action against the Kwara State Government and the All Progressives Congress over alleged libel.
Lawyers acting for Mrs Saraki, on Friday issued a Letter Before Action – Cease And Desist Caution Notice – to Kwara State Government, the state chapter of the APC and one Titi Anifowoshe, a personal aide to Minister-designate, Sen. Gbemisola Rukayat Saraki warning them to retract a defamatory story they sponsored on the social media against the former First Lady of the state on the ownership of Ilorin Amusement Park.
In a letter addressed to the Kwara State APC Chairman, Bashiru Bolarinwa and others, the law firm of Austen-Peters & Co, demanded that the state government, the ruling party and the aide of the minister designate should publish a retraction within 24 hours.
The text of the letter reads in part:
“We write on behalf of Mrs Toyin Saraki (hereinafter referred to as “Our Client”) who has complained about the malicious publication of falsehoods against her person on your Twitter handle known as “@MediaAPC”, published at about 12.45 am on Thursday 15 August 2019, and reproduced and published by Titi Anifowoshe @d_legal_eagle, ostensibly a personal aide to a former Senator, Minister-Nominee Gbemisola Rukayat Saraki Fowora, at 10:57am on 15th August, 2019.
The objectionable tweets respectively contained the following words:
“Kwara State Govt has taken back the Amusement Park from former 1st Lady, Toyin Saraki, wife of former SP Bukola Saraki who took over the property as her personal possession after paying #62M for a land that is worth over #1.2billion using fake company to take over the land.”
And: “Kwara State Govt has taken back the Amusement Park from former 1st Lady, @toyinsaraki Toyin Saraki, wife of former SP @bukolasaraki who took over the property as hers after paying #62M for a land that is worth over #1.2bn using fake company to take over the land. #TakeItBack @d_legal_eagle
In their warning, Austen-Peters & Co further stated: “Our Client finds the entirety of the publication mendacious, libellous and criminally defamatory. She believes that the peddling of malicious falsehood in the said publication was done deliberately and maliciously in a bid to bring her to disrepute before right-thinking members of the public, especially because there is no iota of truth in the publication.
“First, Our Client has never at any time, owned, nor sought to own any portion or the whole, of the Ilorin Metropark, formerly known as Ilorin Amusement Park.
“Secondly, it is pure falsehood to assert that the Kwara State Government has taken back any property from Our Client let alone the Amusement Park, since she never had it.
“Thirdly, there was never a time that Mrs Saraki paid the sum of N62 Million or any other sum for the acquisition of the Amusement Park.
“Lastly, Mrs Saraki has never operated any fake company and it is criminal defamation to allege that she did so and used it to acquire the said Amusement Park. Nothing of such ever took place.
“It is matter of fact for the public record and public knowledge, especially in Ilorin and Kwara State that Our Client, as the First Lady, donated a children’s playground and ancillary landscape gardening, to the Amusement Park in 2004, as a philanthropic gesture, which was enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of children, and their families, freely. Mrs Saraki has not had any contact with the Amusement Park or its then administrators, the Kwara State Ministries of Social Welfare and Works and Housing, ever since the time of her donation in 2004, beyond hosting children’s parties on public and religious holidays, during the time of her then role as First Lady of Kwara State, which concluded on 29th May, 2011”, the law firm stated.
The firm however demanded, “an immediate and unequivocal retraction of the publication by APC Kwara State, to disabuse the mind of the public as to whatever misrepresentation the publication might contain. Such rebuttal should enjoy, as a minimum, similar prominence of place as the original publication.
“An immediate undertaking that you shall not cause to be published, any form of falsehood against Mrs Saraki.”
It also requested an unreserved apology to Mrs Saraki for the publication of malicious falsehood against her person.
While giving the recipients 24 hours to fulfil the above-mentioned demands in full to properly vindicate Mrs Saraki, the lawyers stated that their client reserved her rights in full to seek appropriate remedies without further recourse to the publishers of the objectionable content.
In a related development, records at the High Court, Ilorin, indicate that the case initiated by the Ilorin Emirates Descendants Progressives Union in 2013, which named Mrs Saraki as 7th Defendant along with the purported sellers and purchasers of the Ilorin Amusement Park, a claim which the Kwara State Government had in 2013 denied, had since been discontinued on 7th May 2019, at the request of the claimants. The court had also struck it out.
The alleged purchaser of the Park, Artee Industries, owner operators of Park & Shop, a supermarket conglomerate headquartered in Lagos, and managed by Dutch Firm SPAR Nigeria/DESPAR, is owned by a billionaire Indian family, according to the CAC Register.