According to twitter user Lateef Raji, this happened this morning.
Tuesday, 7 July 2015
Photo: Osun residents hail Gov Aregbesola on his way to his office this morning
According to twitter user Lateef Raji, this happened this morning.
Ex-Super Eagles player Sani Kaita declared missing my new local league club
Former-Super Eagles player, Sani Kaita has been declared missing by his football management, FC IfeanyiUbah of Nnewi.According to the club manager John Obu, the footballer who joined the local league club in May on a 3-year-deal left Awka after a match on July 1 and has not been seen or heard from since then. He didn't report for the match the football club played against the Shooting Stars of Ibadan on Sunday.
“What happened is, when we travelled to Port Harcourt, we were to leave immediately after the game and he was not part of those of us who left and up till now, we have not seen him. But, I don’t need to look for him, he needs to tell me where he is. If he fails to tell me where he is, then we will report to LMC (League Management Company) of his absconding.’ Obu told NAN
We were not led by a woman: Ikorodu bank robbers
The Ikorodu bank robbery suspects that were paraded at the Lagos state
Police command yesterday July 6th , said contrary to what many believed,
no woman led their 18-man gang in the robbery attack they conducted on
two banks in Ikorordu on June 24th.
The robbers, Omoboye, alias Alarm blow, 39; Bright Agbojule, 25; Ikuesan, 37, and Abiwa, 20. during interrogation said some of their members were recruited from Warri, Delta state and that they planned the robbery incident in about 30 minutes.
The robbers, Omoboye, alias Alarm blow, 39; Bright Agbojule, 25; Ikuesan, 37, and Abiwa, 20. during interrogation said some of their members were recruited from Warri, Delta state and that they planned the robbery incident in about 30 minutes.
University of Ibadan emerges best Uni in Nigeria and 8th in Africa
University of Cape Town is number one in Africa, followed by Cairo University, then the University of Pretoria comes third in the Top 10 Universities in Africa. The rest are 3 more from South Africa, two from Egypt, one from Kenya and one from Nigeria (university of Lagos).
Top Universities in Nigeria
1. University of Ibadan - (8th in Africa)
2. University of Nigeria, Nsukka (13th in Africa)
3. Ahmadu Bello University (18th in Africa)
4. University of Lagos (20th in Africa)
5. Obafemi Awolowo University (24th in Africa)
6. University of Ilorin (31st in Africa )
7. University of Port Harcourt (36th in Africa)
6. Nnamdi Azikiwe University (42nd in Africa)
7. University of Calabar (43rd in Africa)
8. Federal University of Technology, Akure (49th in Africa),
9. Covenant University (53rd in Africa) (only private university
Tears in Nadia Buari’s eyes! Why?
Ghanaian
actress, Nadia Buari, may try everything to hide the fact that she is a
mum of twins, but may never be able to hide her feelings.
Earlier in the year, reported that the actress was delivered of two bouncing baby girls but the actress did all she could to get the media off her trail.
But the actress however proved that she had become a mum as she finally posted on twitter.
“Have you ever looked at your kids and had your heart filled with so much love and pride that it brought tears to your eyes. Well, current mood at the moment.#BLESSED” she said
Earlier in the year, reported that the actress was delivered of two bouncing baby girls but the actress did all she could to get the media off her trail.
But the actress however proved that she had become a mum as she finally posted on twitter.
“Have you ever looked at your kids and had your heart filled with so much love and pride that it brought tears to your eyes. Well, current mood at the moment.#BLESSED” she said
Seun Kuti lashes Nigerians’ obsession with US gay marriage issue
Following
the legalisation of gay marriages in the United States of America,
Afrobeat musician, Seun Kuti, has reacted to Nigerians who have
continued to obsess about the action of the US government.
Speaking on the nine Nigerians that are about to get killed through the Sharia law, he took to Twitter to bare his mind. The younger Kuti said, “Gay marriages in America, Nigerians carry am for head. Kano State is about to kill nine people for blasphemy, an outdated crime in a world of free speech, absolute silence.”
“The similarities of religious bigots spread across Islam and Christians. Pastors insult and demean our own original culture, but we are willing to kill for Islam? Kuti asks.
Speaking on the nine Nigerians that are about to get killed through the Sharia law, he took to Twitter to bare his mind. The younger Kuti said, “Gay marriages in America, Nigerians carry am for head. Kano State is about to kill nine people for blasphemy, an outdated crime in a world of free speech, absolute silence.”
“The similarities of religious bigots spread across Islam and Christians. Pastors insult and demean our own original culture, but we are willing to kill for Islam? Kuti asks.
His financial prudence has transformed Osun State —Babayemi, APC chieftain
A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and aspirant to the House of Representatives, Prince Dotun Babayemi, speaks with MOSES ALAO on the economic situation in Osun State and defends style of governance. Excerpts:
THE failure of the Osun State government to pay workers for many months has drawn different comments from various quarters, with most people, especially the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), criticising the governor for his failure in strategic planning. What is your view?
I am happy to say that as of today, the issue of salary in the Osun State is being resolved. Already, the workers have begun to get their remuneration. The state has stood out in the past five years under the governorship of Mr Rauf Aregbesola, in terms of qualitative leadership and development. You know that governance is not just about the payment of salaries; it is about the present and the future. And one of the things that Governor Aregbesola did, which is unique, such that the last time we saw something like that was in the 1960s, was to find a balance between the immediate needs of the state and looking forward to making the state a viable one; viable in the sense that it should have a good network of roads connecting the urban and rural centres such that farm produce can be easily transported from the farms to the city centres.
The government’s plan was and still remains that the state would be the food basket and agricultural hub of the South-West, from where agric produce would come and which would allow the state to generate revenues and create employments. To do that, the governor knew that investments needed to be made and when you are making investments, you should be able to look at the incomes, that accrues to you. So in terms of financial prudence, Governor Rauf Aregbesola has been able to achieve that in Osun State. A couple of things have happened to prove this assertion. One, the internally-generated revenue has been raised significantly from around N300 million that he met to around N900 million monthly. And that was achieved without chasing away businesses from the state or putting unnecessary pressure on citizens.
Two, in a scenario where there is a guaranteed income, which is what the federal allocation is, last year the state got about N4.6 billion monthly out which of N3.6 billion was for salaries, and the governor was able to use the remaining resources to execute the plethora of developmental projects currently ongoing in the state in the education, health and infrastructural sectors. These cannot happen without strategic planning. Unfortunately, we saw what happened at the federal level where the drop in oil price and the fact that so much of the revenue that we should have had under the former President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration were frittered away or siphoned. Imagine 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day being stolen. Eventually, the income of N4.6 billion was cut down drastically such that there was a month that the state got N1.03 billion; how do you meet a commitment of N4.6 billion in that kind of situation?
So, what is happening in Osun State is not an issue of financial incompetence or lack of planning.
There is the view that the state got into its present precarious situation as a result of the deductions occasioned by the many bank loans obtained by the incumbent government running into billions of naira. How true is that?
At the time this government got into office on November 27, 2010, one of the things it met in place was a scenario where loans that had been taken by previous administrations were all short-term loans and if you look at it, the exposure of government at that time was significant. Salary back then was to the tune of about N2 billion. Meanwhile, there were these short-term loan commitments of his predecessors, which did not agree with his vision.
There were two things that the governor saw, some of which we are beginning to hear about and will begin to see at the federal level. First, the governor wanted to cater to the welfare of the people and second, he knew that without eradicating poverty, governance would be meaningless, because when it comes to the time of elections, people would just be looking for money.
So, when he came in, what he did was to consolidate most of the short-term commitments into long-term loans and exposures. When that was not sufficient to be able to run a welfarist programme and execute his vision for a state that can boast of physical and human development, the government further made plans to secure loans which have since been put to good use. Think about it, 40,000 youths were taken off the streets and given a sense of purpose within two years of the Aregbesola’s government. They began to contribute to the economy and he achieved that with an insignificant expense and the impact on the society was great. There was no family that can say that its life was not positively impacted on, whether through a member who had been sitting at home for four years after graduation, but was employed or through training or agricultural empowerment and so on.
But it is quite easy for some people to just look at the last eight months and make unsavoury comments and jump to baseless conclusions. If you want to see how baseless and distant from reality the comments being made by some of these opposition politicians are, you have to look at the governorship election in August 2014.
Respectfully, I can say that people voted for Aregbesola and the APC because they were not going to risk losing what they have seen him do as governor of the state. You see some of the policies and programmes that have worked well in Osun State are what the Federal Government are now looking for ways to expand and introduce across board.
You talked about how the governor has been able to execute his vision for the physical development of the state. But the view in some quarters is that he tried to do too many projects at the same time and ended up not completing them. It is even said that the road projects embarked upon by the administration might not be completed because of the paucity of funds. Is that not right?
That will not be the case. The projects will be completed. For a person that has vision like our governor, the projects embarked upon were done in phases. Ideally, if the right allocations were coming in, some of the projects would have been completed. But in the absence of that, once we are able to sort out the issue of salary payment, then, the projects would receive immediate attention.
What people keep missing is the fact that Governor Aregbesola is not looking at the state as it is now, but as it should be; that is very critical and it is rare to see people with that kind of vision who look beyond the here and now. If you are conversant with the state, Osogbo today is not what it used to be. At the time he started, I can remember the opposition crying wolf that the governor was taking people off the road. But now, when you enter Osogbo, it feels and looks like the capital of a state. The people of Osun State now have pride in the achievements and changes achieved in some of the key cities.
Now, when you talk about roads, a lot of rural roads have been completed. About 80 per cent of the rural roads embarked upon have been done and what was the objective of starting with the rural roads? It is to get farm produce out easily and encourage agriculture. This is not about being political; I am an indigene of the state and I can tell you that there is a huge difference between now and before. A lot of people are coming from outside the state and the country now to take active part in the development of the state because of what they have seen this governor do. There are several programmes that the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the United Nations Education and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO) are getting involved in in Osun State.
You were an aspirant for the House of Representatives, but that aspiration did not materialise. Does it mean the people should look out for you again in the not-too-distant future?
One of the things that attracted me to the political sphere in the first place was the type of politics and governance going on in Osun State. I can say that I run a successful business both in Nigeria and abroad, employing about 17,000 people.
So, running for the House of Representatives is not going to have any significant financial impact. It is because I believe in the style of governance of Governor Aregbesola and his kind of politics that focuses on the welfare of the people that I was drawn towards the development of the state. In the state today, I have personally employed over 2,000 people.
So, politics translates into service for me. The development of the state currently going on under Governor Aregbesola drew me to want to represent my people in the House and into the politics of the APC and I believe that this is the party that will take Nigeria out of the quagmire and put it on the path to the Promised Land.
A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and aspirant to the House of Representatives, Prince Dotun Babayemi, speaks with MOSES ALAO on the economic situation in Osun State and defends style of governance. Excerpts:
THE failure of the Osun State government to pay workers for many months has drawn different comments from various quarters, with most people, especially the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), criticising the governor for his failure in strategic planning. What is your view?
I am happy to say that as of today, the issue of salary in the Osun State is being resolved. Already, the workers have begun to get their remuneration. The state has stood out in the past five years under the governorship of Mr Rauf Aregbesola, in terms of qualitative leadership and development. You know that governance is not just about the payment of salaries; it is about the present and the future. And one of the things that Governor Aregbesola did, which is unique, such that the last time we saw something like that was in the 1960s, was to find a balance between the immediate needs of the state and looking forward to making the state a viable one; viable in the sense that it should have a good network of roads connecting the urban and rural centres such that farm produce can be easily transported from the farms to the city centres.
The government’s plan was and still remains that the state would be the food basket and agricultural hub of the South-West, from where agric produce would come and which would allow the state to generate revenues and create employments. To do that, the governor knew that investments needed to be made and when you are making investments, you should be able to look at the incomes, that accrues to you. So in terms of financial prudence, Governor Rauf Aregbesola has been able to achieve that in Osun State. A couple of things have happened to prove this assertion. One, the internally-generated revenue has been raised significantly from around N300 million that he met to around N900 million monthly. And that was achieved without chasing away businesses from the state or putting unnecessary pressure on citizens.
Two, in a scenario where there is a guaranteed income, which is what the federal allocation is, last year the state got about N4.6 billion monthly out which of N3.6 billion was for salaries, and the governor was able to use the remaining resources to execute the plethora of developmental projects currently ongoing in the state in the education, health and infrastructural sectors. These cannot happen without strategic planning. Unfortunately, we saw what happened at the federal level where the drop in oil price and the fact that so much of the revenue that we should have had under the former President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration were frittered away or siphoned. Imagine 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day being stolen. Eventually, the income of N4.6 billion was cut down drastically such that there was a month that the state got N1.03 billion; how do you meet a commitment of N4.6 billion in that kind of situation?
So, what is happening in Osun State is not an issue of financial incompetence or lack of planning.
There is the view that the state got into its present precarious situation as a result of the deductions occasioned by the many bank loans obtained by the incumbent government running into billions of naira. How true is that?
At the time this government got into office on November 27, 2010, one of the things it met in place was a scenario where loans that had been taken by previous administrations were all short-term loans and if you look at it, the exposure of government at that time was significant. Salary back then was to the tune of about N2 billion. Meanwhile, there were these short-term loan commitments of his predecessors, which did not agree with his vision.
There were two things that the governor saw, some of which we are beginning to hear about and will begin to see at the federal level. First, the governor wanted to cater to the welfare of the people and second, he knew that without eradicating poverty, governance would be meaningless, because when it comes to the time of elections, people would just be looking for money.
So, when he came in, what he did was to consolidate most of the short-term commitments into long-term loans and exposures. When that was not sufficient to be able to run a welfarist programme and execute his vision for a state that can boast of physical and human development, the government further made plans to secure loans which have since been put to good use. Think about it, 40,000 youths were taken off the streets and given a sense of purpose within two years of the Aregbesola’s government. They began to contribute to the economy and he achieved that with an insignificant expense and the impact on the society was great. There was no family that can say that its life was not positively impacted on, whether through a member who had been sitting at home for four years after graduation, but was employed or through training or agricultural empowerment and so on.
But it is quite easy for some people to just look at the last eight months and make unsavoury comments and jump to baseless conclusions. If you want to see how baseless and distant from reality the comments being made by some of these opposition politicians are, you have to look at the governorship election in August 2014.
Respectfully, I can say that people voted for Aregbesola and the APC because they were not going to risk losing what they have seen him do as governor of the state. You see some of the policies and programmes that have worked well in Osun State are what the Federal Government are now looking for ways to expand and introduce across board.
You talked about how the governor has been able to execute his vision for the physical development of the state. But the view in some quarters is that he tried to do too many projects at the same time and ended up not completing them. It is even said that the road projects embarked upon by the administration might not be completed because of the paucity of funds. Is that not right?
That will not be the case. The projects will be completed. For a person that has vision like our governor, the projects embarked upon were done in phases. Ideally, if the right allocations were coming in, some of the projects would have been completed. But in the absence of that, once we are able to sort out the issue of salary payment, then, the projects would receive immediate attention.
What people keep missing is the fact that Governor Aregbesola is not looking at the state as it is now, but as it should be; that is very critical and it is rare to see people with that kind of vision who look beyond the here and now. If you are conversant with the state, Osogbo today is not what it used to be. At the time he started, I can remember the opposition crying wolf that the governor was taking people off the road. But now, when you enter Osogbo, it feels and looks like the capital of a state. The people of Osun State now have pride in the achievements and changes achieved in some of the key cities.
Now, when you talk about roads, a lot of rural roads have been completed. About 80 per cent of the rural roads embarked upon have been done and what was the objective of starting with the rural roads? It is to get farm produce out easily and encourage agriculture. This is not about being political; I am an indigene of the state and I can tell you that there is a huge difference between now and before. A lot of people are coming from outside the state and the country now to take active part in the development of the state because of what they have seen this governor do. There are several programmes that the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the United Nations Education and Scientific Organisation (UNESCO) are getting involved in in Osun State.
You were an aspirant for the House of Representatives, but that aspiration did not materialise. Does it mean the people should look out for you again in the not-too-distant future?
One of the things that attracted me to the political sphere in the first place was the type of politics and governance going on in Osun State. I can say that I run a successful business both in Nigeria and abroad, employing about 17,000 people.
So, running for the House of Representatives is not going to have any significant financial impact. It is because I believe in the style of governance of Governor Aregbesola and his kind of politics that focuses on the welfare of the people that I was drawn towards the development of the state. In the state today, I have personally employed over 2,000 people.
So, politics translates into service for me. The development of the state currently going on under Governor Aregbesola drew me to want to represent my people in the House and into the politics of the APC and I believe that this is the party that will take Nigeria out of the quagmire and put it on the path to the Promised Land.
As unpaid salary crisis tears Osun apart…
Aregbesola
has destroyed Osun with lack of strategic plan —PDP chairman His
financial prudence has transformed Osun State —Babayemi, APC chieftain
Chairman
of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Osun State, Alhaji Gani
Olaoluwa, speaks with MOSES ALAO over the Governor Rauf Aregbesola-led
government’s failure to pay workers’ salaries and the economic situation
of the state. Excerpts:
YOUR
party appears to have failed, following the loss of the last
presidential election. It also lost in almost all the elections it
fielded candidates for in Osun State. Since then, you have become
silent. Does that not mean you are not on ground?
I will not agree with you that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has failed. What the loss means is that we have temporarily stepped aside. This is why I will not agree that we have failed. It is not as if we lost all elections or have no governors or seats in the National Assembly and the state assemblies.
You would have been right, if the All Progressives Congress (APC) had won all the governorship and National Assembly seats. Just because we decided to give peace a chance; because we did not want bloodshed, by conceding defeat even when there were glaring evidences of conspiracy and irregularities, does not mean the PDP has failed. We have not failed and we are sure that the party will return stronger.
And if you say that Osun State PDP has resigned to fate, you are right. One should always accept whatever God decides in any matter. But to say that the PDP has become silent or has only been engaging in vainglory is unacceptable. We can never keep silent in the face of the suffering being meted to the people of the state by the APC.
And our claim about being on ground is not mere boasting. You will have to wait till when there is another election to find that out. I am confident that the PDP will come out victorious in any election conducted in Osun State.
You are fond of saying that you will defeat APC; yet, you recorded a poor showing in the national and state Assembly elections. What went wrong?
One thing about elections is that the outcomes of others are always affected by the first. You will recall the international conspiracy that played out in the last general election. But right before then, the APC had programmed the Osun governorship election to serve as its precursor to the last general election. And you will recall that for more than three years, we had been complaining about Ambassador Rufus Akeju, who was the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Osun State. We said times and again that he was planted to harm the PDP and that there was no way we could win an election with Akeju as REC. We fought, we wrote petitions to the former Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman, the National Assembly, the Presidency and so on, that we had no confidence in Akeju.
But we became helpless and eventually, the APC perfected its rigging machinery and won the August 9 governorship election. We were not surprised that we lost that election. Now, after losing that election, enough ground had been prepared for the last general election.
In any case, the last exercise in which you claimed that we lost virtually all elections, I can boldly assert, will go down in history as one of the worst, because we saw and raised the alarm that Attahiru Jega had a hidden agenda and he eventually carried it out.
Some people believe it was one of the best elections, especially with the card reader innovation and all that. What do you say to that?
Forget card readers. Card readers were only used where INEC wanted to reduce the voting strength of the PDP. They have perfected the plans. Which card readers are you talking about? Did you not hear of massive underage voting in the North? How did they get voter cards and what did card readers do to stop them? How did 1.9 million voters vote in Kano without a void vote? Ask yourself these questions and you will understand that the last election was not transparent.
Your party was accused of politicising the plight of workers in Osun State who were owed about nine months’ salary until recently, with the APC indicting you of connivance with a judge of the state High Court to attempt destroy the government. What is your reaction?
The problem we have in Osun State today, regarding workers’ salary, we pray it does not happen to other states. It is something that makes people cry; it reminds one of Somalia where hunger killed thousands of people. Maybe that was where Aregbesola was trained, because he has been meting out capital punishment to workers and people of the state through his failure to pay salaries. Everyone in the state is suffering as a result of his lack of focus and strategic planning.
Before he became governor, he knew that Osun State thrives on workers’ salaries, knowing that there are no industries. But he has failed to pay that for nine months, when it is not as if there were no allocations. And he still has the gut to go about lying to the people.
Anyway, we are encouraged that he spoke the truth for once when he said he was no longer in control of the situation. And we thought he was going to resign as men of reason do whenever they admit to have failed.
And to respond to the nonsensical statement that the PDP connived with Justice Folahanmi Oloyede: of course, the whole world can see that the APC is confused and desperate to blame its failure on someone else. We need not connive with anyone, because we have held our ground against Aregbesola’s misrule for five years.
However, it was good that we still have men and women of reason and courage like Justice Oloyede, who can speak up for what is right, not minding whose ox would be gored. Osun State needs courageous people like her at a time like this and posterity will vindicate her.
So, if the APC sees Oloyede and the PDP’s position as a product of connivance, then, it must be good; that is a positive connivance for the freedom of our state and the betterment of its people. And we are calling on the House of Assembly to redeem its image at this point by looking into the petition sent by the judge. The speaker, Honourable Najeem Salaam, and other members of the House should act right so that posterity will vindicate them. Honourable Adejare Bello was speaker in this state and his good deeds continue to be remembered. Salaam should stand for what is right at this important point in the life of our state.
Is it true that the PDP has been politicising the matter unnecessarily?
What are you saying? How has the PDP politicised the failure of the government to pay salaries for nine months? Did the state government not owe salaries? Are workers not on strike? Is the state not in economic comatose? Have projects not been stopped? Has Aregbesola not suspended all the programmes with which he deceived Osun people to be elected into office, like the food supply to pupils and so on? Did Aregbesola not say that the situation was beyond his control?
How is the PDP responsible for any of these? You see, anyone saying that the PDP is politicising the matter must be one of those who brought the state to its present state. Thank God for the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN); the Islamic leadership; two senators from Ogun and Bayelsa who are PDP members and other PDP leaders in Osun State as well as others too numerous to mention, that have made efforts to mitigate the suffering of the workers. But the truth is that no amount of foodstuffs can fill the void left by the non-payment of salaries and it is a shame that Aregbesola’s promise of heaven and earth can only produce a paltry one and a half month salary, which cannot take the workers anywhere.
You have always been critical of Governor Aregbesola, but he has continued to defeat the PDP. Don’t you think his love for the people made them vote for him?
Did you say love for the people? Which love? We told you that they rigged elections and you talk about love for the people? I challenge any Osun State indigene that has been empowered by Aregbesola to come out and say it. What has he done for Osun State and its people? He has nothing to show in the last five years; no single project has been commissioned, despite the billions he has borrowed. All the roads he took loans to construct have been abandoned and with the economic hardship the governor has brought on Osun State, which now has to borrow to pay salaries, Osun State people should as well not expect him to complete any of the projects.
How do you react to the fact that contrary to what you are saying, the government insists that it has been carrying out developmental projects such as road constructions and others?
The governor only builds roads in newspapers and on billboards. What I and other people of Osun State see every day are abandoned projects or uncompleted projects that have begun to fail even before the completion, such as the Ikirun – Osogbo road.
If we are not careful, Osun State might soon be cut off from the rest of the South-West as a result of the bad condition that Aregbesola’s contractors have left the roads they are supposedly constructing. They dredged holes, destroyed what used to be good roads and could no longer construct new ones. People prefer that he left them untouched and allow the Federal Road Management Agency (FERMA) to continue to maintain them, rather than impose the current deplorable condition. Gbongan – Osogbo road is now more terrible than it was before.
Unfortunately, the governor has taken loans for all these uncompleted works. He has obtained loans that would not be fully repaid until 2040.
I will not agree with you that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has failed. What the loss means is that we have temporarily stepped aside. This is why I will not agree that we have failed. It is not as if we lost all elections or have no governors or seats in the National Assembly and the state assemblies.
You would have been right, if the All Progressives Congress (APC) had won all the governorship and National Assembly seats. Just because we decided to give peace a chance; because we did not want bloodshed, by conceding defeat even when there were glaring evidences of conspiracy and irregularities, does not mean the PDP has failed. We have not failed and we are sure that the party will return stronger.
And if you say that Osun State PDP has resigned to fate, you are right. One should always accept whatever God decides in any matter. But to say that the PDP has become silent or has only been engaging in vainglory is unacceptable. We can never keep silent in the face of the suffering being meted to the people of the state by the APC.
And our claim about being on ground is not mere boasting. You will have to wait till when there is another election to find that out. I am confident that the PDP will come out victorious in any election conducted in Osun State.
You are fond of saying that you will defeat APC; yet, you recorded a poor showing in the national and state Assembly elections. What went wrong?
One thing about elections is that the outcomes of others are always affected by the first. You will recall the international conspiracy that played out in the last general election. But right before then, the APC had programmed the Osun governorship election to serve as its precursor to the last general election. And you will recall that for more than three years, we had been complaining about Ambassador Rufus Akeju, who was the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Osun State. We said times and again that he was planted to harm the PDP and that there was no way we could win an election with Akeju as REC. We fought, we wrote petitions to the former Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman, the National Assembly, the Presidency and so on, that we had no confidence in Akeju.
But we became helpless and eventually, the APC perfected its rigging machinery and won the August 9 governorship election. We were not surprised that we lost that election. Now, after losing that election, enough ground had been prepared for the last general election.
In any case, the last exercise in which you claimed that we lost virtually all elections, I can boldly assert, will go down in history as one of the worst, because we saw and raised the alarm that Attahiru Jega had a hidden agenda and he eventually carried it out.
Some people believe it was one of the best elections, especially with the card reader innovation and all that. What do you say to that?
Forget card readers. Card readers were only used where INEC wanted to reduce the voting strength of the PDP. They have perfected the plans. Which card readers are you talking about? Did you not hear of massive underage voting in the North? How did they get voter cards and what did card readers do to stop them? How did 1.9 million voters vote in Kano without a void vote? Ask yourself these questions and you will understand that the last election was not transparent.
Your party was accused of politicising the plight of workers in Osun State who were owed about nine months’ salary until recently, with the APC indicting you of connivance with a judge of the state High Court to attempt destroy the government. What is your reaction?
The problem we have in Osun State today, regarding workers’ salary, we pray it does not happen to other states. It is something that makes people cry; it reminds one of Somalia where hunger killed thousands of people. Maybe that was where Aregbesola was trained, because he has been meting out capital punishment to workers and people of the state through his failure to pay salaries. Everyone in the state is suffering as a result of his lack of focus and strategic planning.
Before he became governor, he knew that Osun State thrives on workers’ salaries, knowing that there are no industries. But he has failed to pay that for nine months, when it is not as if there were no allocations. And he still has the gut to go about lying to the people.
Anyway, we are encouraged that he spoke the truth for once when he said he was no longer in control of the situation. And we thought he was going to resign as men of reason do whenever they admit to have failed.
And to respond to the nonsensical statement that the PDP connived with Justice Folahanmi Oloyede: of course, the whole world can see that the APC is confused and desperate to blame its failure on someone else. We need not connive with anyone, because we have held our ground against Aregbesola’s misrule for five years.
However, it was good that we still have men and women of reason and courage like Justice Oloyede, who can speak up for what is right, not minding whose ox would be gored. Osun State needs courageous people like her at a time like this and posterity will vindicate her.
So, if the APC sees Oloyede and the PDP’s position as a product of connivance, then, it must be good; that is a positive connivance for the freedom of our state and the betterment of its people. And we are calling on the House of Assembly to redeem its image at this point by looking into the petition sent by the judge. The speaker, Honourable Najeem Salaam, and other members of the House should act right so that posterity will vindicate them. Honourable Adejare Bello was speaker in this state and his good deeds continue to be remembered. Salaam should stand for what is right at this important point in the life of our state.
Is it true that the PDP has been politicising the matter unnecessarily?
What are you saying? How has the PDP politicised the failure of the government to pay salaries for nine months? Did the state government not owe salaries? Are workers not on strike? Is the state not in economic comatose? Have projects not been stopped? Has Aregbesola not suspended all the programmes with which he deceived Osun people to be elected into office, like the food supply to pupils and so on? Did Aregbesola not say that the situation was beyond his control?
How is the PDP responsible for any of these? You see, anyone saying that the PDP is politicising the matter must be one of those who brought the state to its present state. Thank God for the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN); the Islamic leadership; two senators from Ogun and Bayelsa who are PDP members and other PDP leaders in Osun State as well as others too numerous to mention, that have made efforts to mitigate the suffering of the workers. But the truth is that no amount of foodstuffs can fill the void left by the non-payment of salaries and it is a shame that Aregbesola’s promise of heaven and earth can only produce a paltry one and a half month salary, which cannot take the workers anywhere.
You have always been critical of Governor Aregbesola, but he has continued to defeat the PDP. Don’t you think his love for the people made them vote for him?
Did you say love for the people? Which love? We told you that they rigged elections and you talk about love for the people? I challenge any Osun State indigene that has been empowered by Aregbesola to come out and say it. What has he done for Osun State and its people? He has nothing to show in the last five years; no single project has been commissioned, despite the billions he has borrowed. All the roads he took loans to construct have been abandoned and with the economic hardship the governor has brought on Osun State, which now has to borrow to pay salaries, Osun State people should as well not expect him to complete any of the projects.
How do you react to the fact that contrary to what you are saying, the government insists that it has been carrying out developmental projects such as road constructions and others?
The governor only builds roads in newspapers and on billboards. What I and other people of Osun State see every day are abandoned projects or uncompleted projects that have begun to fail even before the completion, such as the Ikirun – Osogbo road.
If we are not careful, Osun State might soon be cut off from the rest of the South-West as a result of the bad condition that Aregbesola’s contractors have left the roads they are supposedly constructing. They dredged holes, destroyed what used to be good roads and could no longer construct new ones. People prefer that he left them untouched and allow the Federal Road Management Agency (FERMA) to continue to maintain them, rather than impose the current deplorable condition. Gbongan – Osogbo road is now more terrible than it was before.
Unfortunately, the governor has taken loans for all these uncompleted works. He has obtained loans that would not be fully repaid until 2040.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)