Michael Ogunsina, the Oyo state PRO of the PDP stirred the hornets nest a couple of days ago.
He hit hard at one of the Honourable members representing Saki in the Oyo state House of Assembly on the platform of the APC.
The Honourable member had said that Governor Makinde is starving them of Constituency developments funds.
Ogunsina would have none of that and he wrote a stinking piece, calling the Honourable member all manner of unprintable names.
My take is simple. I know that Michael Ogunsina must have seen a viral video of Debo Ogundoyin, the Speaker of the Oyo state House of Assembly shortly before the March 28, 2023 gubernatorial and House of Assembly election.
In the video, Debo Ogundoyin was seen telling his Constituents the same thing the Honourable member from Saki just repeated.
If Ogunsina does not have the video, I will oblige him and thereafter, I challenge him to go against Debo Ogundoyin with equal venom.
I have been on the same studio with the young man and I have equally read some of his writings.
Brilliant young man. No doubts but his overzealousness is his undoing.
In the matter of the House of Assembly, he is just a Busy body and would have done himself a lot of good by keeping his mouth shut.
The last time I checked, the Oyo state House of Assembly is not an appendage of the Oyo state PDP Secretariat which ought to be his primary concern.
There is just too much chaos around this present Government.
That is not the focus of this piece.
I was in the studio of a popular Radio station in Ibadan last Saturday.
The anchor of the program invited me to analyze Governor Seyi Makinde’s second term, ” Omi Tuntun 2.0″, which would enter its mid-term in a couple of weeks.
The first question the presenter sought my opinion upon is an appraisal of Governor Makinde’s activities in the almost two years of his second term.
I responded by telling him that you can not build something on nothing.
I told him that even Governor Makinde himself claims that he is building on the ” successes” recorded under ” Omi Tuntun 1.0″.
I know some of you who are not familiar with Oyo state politics would wonder what ” Omi Tuntun” means.
I have also been wondering why the Governor is finding it impossible to detach himself from his obsession with ” Omi”.
It is always ” Omi this”, “Omi that”. You will think that the Governor of Oyo state is from a background where they worshipped the ” Osun goddess”.
At any rate, I told the presenter that I would rather address Governor Makinde’s first and second term and refrain from the reference to his terms as ” Omi” whatever.
I started my analysis by drawing the attention of the presenter and the listeners to the Governor’s said and done.
I highlighted the promises made by Governor Makinde before he became Governor in 2019.
I made reference to the fact that as at the time Governor Makinde took over as Governor in 2019, the total debts profile of Oyo state was about a hundred and forty five billion Naira and that as we speak, the debts profile of the state and the Local Governments have skyrocketed to a point that Governor Makinde himself is ashamed of telling the public the exact figures.
I drew attention to the fact that president Bola Ahmed Tinubu have kept saying that he has increased monthly Allocations to the states and Local Governments tremendously and Governor Makinde has not denied these claims but yet, he kept borrowing recklessly.
I drew the attention of the public to the 200 billion Naira Loan the Oyo state House of Assembly just approved for the Governor.
I went further to draw the attention of the public to the fact that Governor Makinde has been spending the resources of the 33 Local Governments and committing them to debts illegally.
I told the presenter that the Government of Makinde lacks transparency and in the absence of fiscal transparency, I will be justified to record Governor Makinde as a failure.
His data boys went into a frenzy of anger and when it was time to take calls from the public, a couple of them came hard on me.
Unfortunately, they had no concrete facts with which to defend the Governor beyond the rhetorics of he is paying salaries. He is employing Teachers.
I must say that while I was sympathetic to the plight of the ” defenders” of the Governor for displaying crass incompetence, I was overwhelmed with the rate at which the public is now beginning to see through the lies and deceits of this Government.
More than I could have done, perhaps, a couple of callers exposed the hypocrisy of Governor Makinde’s Education policies and condemned the terrible state of infrastructures in our public schools.
The Governor also received knocks for the state of infrastructures, most especially, roads at the rural areas.
A particular caller made reference to the fact that Governor Makinde has committed himself to rehabilitating roads that needed no rehabilitation within Ibadan, leaving out the ones that actually require Government’s attention.
That interview gave me a deep insight into Governor Makinde’s style of accumulating perceived public support.
I believed, for the first time that there are actually some funny elements whose job is to call in on Radio programs and keep praising the Governor while trying to intimidate guests who have contrary opinions about Makinde’s Government.
They failed on the day and will fail any other day because facts are sacred and the Governor has a responsibility to be transparent and as much as he decides to hide behind some Data boys or what do they call them, the Governor would be exposed rather than being protected.
The job of defending Governor Makinde is extremely difficult if not impossible.
Just yesterday, I was on to a Radio program on another popular Radio station in Ibadan.
The Chairman of Mapo, I think that is Ibadan South East Local Government was on the program.
It was a Yoruba program and I must say in all honesty that I seriously sympathize with the gentleman.
He cut the pictures of a pathetic and helpless personality, who knew what was right but is lacking in the capacity to do it.
In the gentleman, you will see why Governor Makinde is very violent in resisting Local Government Autonomy.
Violent you asked? Yes. The Governor is violently resisting the implementation of the judgment of the Supreme court which have since become Law from the day it was passed.
Before I go further on the interview of the Chairman of Mapo, let me digress a bit.
In the course of the same program, a representative of the Mayegun Market traders had spoken about the plight of a particular Association within the market.
There was a fire incident. The marketers, despite the losses still managed to rebuild their shops but a Developer from Government is still demanding sums between two to three million Naira per shop owner from them before they could move into the shops they rebuilt on their own!
The particular area which interests me most is where he referred to one ” Oga Seye”.
According to the man, in the course of holding several meetings with the Chairman of the Local Government, the Chairman referred them to ” Oga Seye”.
I am glad that one of the analysts on the program dealt with this issue very well by asking what business a non state actor like the ” Oga Seye” has with Government business.
I laughed when I saw the frustration of the analyst with regards to this particular non state actor.
So much is going on in Oyo state. I will soon have time to deal with the issue of the non state actor in question.
Back to the Chairman of Mapo.
Like I said, the gentleman sounded pitiable. He was not ashamed to say that he went to beg the Governor for assistance to do a particular bad road within his Local Government.
At another time, he said the Governor sent for him to bring proposal for the rehabilitation of a road in his Local Government.
He was asked about the bad road behind the Local Government Secretariat and he said his mind didn’t even go there!
I noticed that he kept referring to the Governor as ” Oga”, ” Oga” as if he is some Special Assistant or Personal Assistant to the Governor.
I pitied him when he started to beg people of his Local Government to be patient with his Government.
You would think he was a chanter of Ijala who was invited purposely to chant Ijala in the praises of Governor Makinde.
That is why Governor Makinde will never wish that the financial autonomy for Local Governments become a reality.
Under him, Local Government Chairmen can not even think on their own to decide on which projects to do.
It is the Governor who decides what, where and when and when he does, it is him who will appoint a contractor of his choice to carry out projects for a Local Government!
That is what some of his lickspittles would not want us to talk about.
To this ” Olentelafas”, no matter what Makinde does, you just must clap.
It will never happen. They have forgotten that the same Makinde once said that the only positive thing he saw in the Ajimobi’s eight years was Ajimobi’s sense of dressing well.
The Chairman of Mapo also made a revelation which is good for the records.
He said the 11 Local Governments in Ibadan contributed the resources with which the Olubadan Palace was built.
Question is, who got the credits for that? Now you know who to give the credits to.
So much has been said about the #80,000 minimum wage in Oyo state.
He who wears the shoes know where it pinches.
I can confidently say that parastatals in Oyo state are excluded from the minimum wage, no matter how badly packaged.
If you are in doubt, go and ask staffs of BCOS or the Oyo state Judiciary Staffs. They are not the only ones involved. The Governor just added a meagre sum of 5 million Naira to the initial 27 million Naira he used to release monthly to the BCOS.
Those who have a kind of a fair deal are the Teachers and the civil service and even at that, it is a surprise that the total take home of an Osun state civil servant is better than that of Oyo state.
Osun is paying 70,000 Naira minimum wage while Oyo is paying 80,000 Naira. Yet, side by side, Osun civil servants on 70,000 are better of.
That is Governor Makinde in action.
Everything na audio.
SOLA ABEGUNDE.
