The opposition in Ogun State has gone full circle. At the
inauguration of the Government of Otunba Gbenga Daniel they sneered at
what they described as his lack of experience in Government that would
result in low performance. After the governor has been universally
acknowledged to have done creditably well by giving governance a new
human face, the opposition changed tactics, calling his projects white
elephants. That also failed to achieve the desired effect. At least no
objective person will describe the OGD administration’ s preoccupation
with the rehabilitation and building of schools, hospitals, opening up
new roads, construction of homes for displaced villagers and provision
of key social amenities as white elephant projects.
Now
the new campaign tool of the opposition is to “demonize” Governor Daniel
as a breeder of cultists and an instigator of violence in order to
damage his credibility in the run up to the 2007 election. Their new
trump card is a statement allegedly reported in Elendu Reports, an
Internet publication, where governor Daniel was quoted to have
threatened that the coming election in Ogun State would be bloody. The
fact is that at no time did Governor Daniel make such a statement. As a
responsible statesman who detests violence in words and deeds, Governor
Daniel could not have threatened violence in a state that he has near
universal acceptance and huge followership due mainly to the many
dividends of democracy that his good governance has engendered. All
through his stint as a private businessman, Gov. Daniel has always
eschewed violence. Even in government he has preached politics without
bitterness and violence. He has nothing whatsoever to do with violence.
Those individuals who have failed to fault him on performance and
probity are now very desperate. They are the ones selling the dummies of
intolerance and violence in a desperate bid to impugn the character of
Governor Daniel.
The
opposition is also bent on whipping up ethnic sentiment and believes
fervently that it can only make headway in its desperate bid for power
by dividing the people through appeal to their ethnic orientation. That
is why they continue to talk about the marginalization of the Yewa/Awori
people.
Facts on the ground will give a lie to their contention
that the Yewa/Awori axis of the state continues to suffer
marginalisation under Governor Daniel. For the first time since the
creation of the state the Yewa/Awori have been brought fully into the
scheme of things in the state. The Daniel administration established a
campus of the Olabisi Onabanjo University at Aiyetoro, built a
multi-million naira international market at Yewa, resuscitated the
moribund school of nursing in Ilaro and has also constructed many roads,
equipped many hospitals and health centres and ensured that like other
parts of the state the Yewa/Awori people enjoy the dividends of
democracy.
It
is on record that prominent citizens of Yewa/Awori extraction including
Dr. Tunji Otegbeye and Ambassador Ebun Oyagbola have all saluted the
developmental efforts of the Otunba Daniel administration saying that
the Ogun West Senatorial District had never had it this good since the
creation of the state. Those who are shouting marginalization are simply
playing the ethnic card in their macabre game for power.
The opposition is also targeting the state’s progressive
civil servants in its bid to rubbish Governor Daniel. They are spreading
rumours of retrenchment and imminent purge among the rank and file of
the public servants. Their sole aim is to cause disaffection against the
person and government of Otunba Daniel. There is no planned
retrenchment of workers either now or in the future. It will be a
contradiction in terms for a government whose cardinal contract with the
people is the creation and generation of employment to do so. It is a
known fact that employment was at a zero level on May 29, 2003. Prior
to the coming into office of the Government of Governor Gbenga Daniel,
there was virtual embargo on employment in the civil service. What this
meant was that for almost 4 years before he came into office, there were
hardly any employments at all. Now the total number of those who have
been recruited directly into the public service has passed the 10,000
mark. This has been made possible through filling vacancies and the
establishment of new strategic ministries and bodies for improved
service delivery to the people.
The Ogun State wing of the Nigerian Labour Congress
recently declared Governor Daniel as the most labour friendly governor.
Just as they were presenting the plaque of the Award to him at the May
Day Rally held inside the newly refurbished M.K.O. Abiola International
Stadium, Abeokuta, 711 civil servants were celebrating their promotion
approved by Governor Daniel. Of the lot 435 belong to the senior cadre
while 276 belong to the junior cadre. They join a growing band of
thousands of public officers who have been so promoted in the last three
years.
Since
his assumption of office, late and accumulated promotion exercise has
become a thing of the past. The regular promotion exercise has reversed
the trend of haphazard promotion and stunted career growth, which were
the lot of the public service under previous administrations. When
Governor Daniel came in he met 22 Permanent Secretaries. However, 38
months after the number has risen to 33. The establishment of Ministries
of Environment, Forestry, Housing, Special Duties, Local Government and
Chieftaincy Affairs and Community Development and Cooperatives threw up
six new Permanent Secretaries. The creation of the Information and
Communications Technology, ICT, Economic Planning and Development, Urban
and Physical Planning, Ogun State Employment Generation Programme,
Bureau of Transportation and Office of the Chief of Staff gave another
six directors opportunities to advance to the position of Permanent
Secretaries.
The
biggest fallacy in their campaign of calumny is the declaration that
amenities remain at the level the former administration left them. It is
on record that in three years the OGD administration has built more
rural roads, installed more transformers, built more houses, and has
impacted better on the living standards of the people than the past
administration. Everyday the Ogun State Road Maintenance Agency and the
Rural Road Commission are daily opening up new roads or rehabilitating
existing ones in urban and rural settings. Rural dwellers are also
delighted by the provision of hand pumps and boreholes. And villagers
whose wards had to travel many kilometers before getting to school have
been saved that ordeal as schools, which were closed down in the last
dispensation, have now been reopened.
Those
who live in Abeokuta know that there is no acute water scarcity. In the
last one year due to a robust initiative of the government the water
supply situation has significantly changed for the better. New pumps
have been purchased and installed at the State Water Corporation while
expansion schemes, which past
administrations simply refused to embarked on, have been
initiated and are adding to the improved water supply situation in
Abeokuta and other parts of the state. Abeokuta like other major cities
in Nigeria is expanding at an exponential rate. The failure of past
administrations that simply neglected strategic planning is being
corrected and the results will soon be apparent.
It
is obvious that as the government of Otunba Gbenga Daniel continues to
make giant strides and win more converts to its business unusual
approach to governance which is yielding multiple dividends of
democracy, the trade in rumour and blackmail will continue to boom in
Ogun State. The men and women who believe that the best way to halt
Governor Daniel is to spread damaging rumour will definitely step up
their perfidious acts. They will also cook up more salacious but false
tales to be sold to members of the public through the media.
The
people of Ogun State are not buying their lies. This is to be expected.
When a government addresses the basic needs of the people and create
opportunities for them to fully realize themselves, the people will
celebrate the man at the helm of affairs to no end. They would also
support him in words and deeds. This is certainly the case in Ogun State
where the people and impartial observers from far and near are rooting
for the man fondly called Ogidi Omo. They are openly asking him to
continue his good work in the Gateway State to the discomfiture of a
tiny band of members of the opposition.
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