FEATURE ARTICLE

Folorunso OladipupoThursday, August 21, 2014
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OPEN LETTER TO MY STATE GOVERNOR, SEN. ABIOLA AJIMOBI OF OYO STATE (PART 6 OF 8)
THE OSUN EXPERIENCE

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Continued from Part 5

y first five letters discussed the Ekiti tsunami Vis a Vis the current situation of Oyo state. With the recently concluded governorship election at the state of Osun, it is just natural to compare and contrast the possible implication of the victory of the Oranmiyan of our time, Ogbeni Rauf Adesoji Aderemi over the PDP combatants and their flag bearer, Senator iyiola Omisore.

On the eve of the Osun election, you also gave a blanket renewal to the tenure of the 33 caretaker committee chairmen in Oyo state. Obviously, the renewal will have an implication (negative or positive). This will also be x-rayed here.

The victory of Aregbesola of our great party, APC signified the acceptance of our party over the other parties in the state of Osun. It was an endorsement of the good works of Aregbesola administration despite the over-militarization of the electoral process. The arrest of our party leaders and in fact our national leader, Alhaji Lai Mohammed. The militarization was aimed at intimidation of our voters as well as the general populace with the belief that if people are scared from going to the voting centers, rooms will be available for rigging and manipulation of the people's choice. But the people of Osun stood by my party and the flag bearer to ensure success at the pool.

One of the factors that made our victory possible in Osun is the fact that no notable politician decamped from our party to the opposition. Rather than recording out-flow of politicians like Oyo state, Osun under Aregbesola had inflow of notable politicians from PDP, notable among the politicians who came to APC are: Former Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola, Former Governor Isiaka Adeleke, Former Speaker House of Representatives, Hon. Olubunmi Etteh and thousands of their followers. With these calibers of new APC politicians, PDP was already an empty shell before the election started. Your Excellency, How many decampees have you received into Oyo state APC and how many of our high caliber leaders have decamped to other parties?

In terms of physical development, what can we compare to the massive building of schools, roads and hospital buildings in Osun? The only thing you are able to talk about in Oyo state is the Mokola bridge. Of what use is the Mokola Bridge in Ibadan to my home town in Oke Ogun, Ogbomosho people, the Ibarapas and the people in Oyo town? In fact what use is it to Apete people whose bridge continues to give way to minimum rain drop?

On education side, the feeding system for pupils in Osun schools, the free uniforms for students, the distribution of tablets and ipad (Opon Imo) to the students, the payment of N5, 000 per monthly to eligible elders (Agba Osun) all these did the wonders. What are the equivalents of these performances in Oyo?

The administration of Aregbesola started their youths empowerment program O-YES at least 10 months before we started our own YES-O yet none of the 20,000 youths engaged by Osun has missed a single payment. However, none of the shabbily engaged YES-O cadets in Oyo state has ever received three consecutive monthly allowances. While those in Oyo were disbanded and re-engaged twice, those in Osun have never been disbanded once. What will be the contribution of these YES-O cadets to our election in 2015?

It should also be mentioned here that the O-YES of the state of Osun was well planned, focused and properly executed. Rather being used to make unnecessary news, the cadets in Osun were trained in vocations of their choices like agriculture and food production, computer training, computer repairs, barbing and hair dressing, building, carpentry, shoe making and other life skills. With this, they become self employed, self reliant and useful members of the society. Which of these beneficiaries or their family members will have the conscience to vote against Aregbesola?

As stated in my earlier letters, conduct and non-conduct of local government elections will play a role in Oyo election. Apart from this, the caliber and public acceptability of those you appoint as chairman and caretaker committee members in the various local governments will play a role.

With your reappointment of caretaker committee members for another six months starting from August 8th, 2014 to February 7th, 2015, it is a clear indication that these reappointed chairmen will be your faces, your representatives and your commander of the various councils during the coming elections. Giving the political imbalances associated with their appointments in many local governments and people's aggression towards their reappointments, you have woefully lost the various councils if these are not reviewed within a month.

You received various petitions and complain against the council chairmen. Yet you refused to treat the vital petitions from our party leaders as well as the youths in the party. You allow the radio and television propaganda embarked upon by the council chairmen to deceive you into their reappointments.

We have situations where both youths and elders of the party complained about the incompetence of your appointees. The fact is that you cannot know the local governments more than the leaders and the youths complaining about your appointees. Yet you reappointed them. We have situations where you complained of inept and incompetence of your appointees, yet you return them. You are planning to use those who are not wanted by the people to represent you and to canvass for your votes. The only reasonable deduction from this reappointment is that you have decided to sink the party with your appointees or you are just joking about having a second term in office.

To be Continued��������������������.

Yours

Folorunso Oladipupo

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