Senator Akinlabi Olasunkanmi, former Minister of Youths Development and chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who recently joined the race to contest the 2014 gubernatorial election in the state, speaks, in this interview, on the government of Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola and the chances of the PDP in 2014 in Osun. TAIWO ADISA brings the excerpts: You are a leader of the PDP in Osun State,.How would you assess the current administration in the state, especially as the gubernatorial election is due in 2014? We all know that the Okefia (Government House),that is what we call it in Osun will become vacant come 2014. It will be time again for the governor who the judiciary appointed to vacate office and it will be time for another election in 2014. I have put myself forward courtesy of my people to come and serve them at that level come 2014. The journey will be challenging but why are you there. There is no doubt about that we are supposed to face challenges and I am very sure that I would do that work with my pedigree, with the support of my people, I have no doubt about it that I will occupy that seat come 2014. I am well prepared for that and with God being on our side, we are going to surmount all the challenges and emerge as the governor of Osun State. As we go along, as is common in political terrain, there will be brickbats, there will be dialogue; there will be mudslinging, but we will try as much as possible, in line with my own philosophy, play a very clean game. People say that politics is dirty. I don’t believe it is dirty because if it is, people that can make it clean can come in and make it clean. One of the pertinent questions you should ask is that having served as a senator between 2003 and 2007 and having served as minister between 2007 and 2011, why am I in this race? I am in the race because of the problems, because of the issues and because of the challenges that our people in Osun State have been facing since the emergence of Governor Aregbesola after his judicial victory. Yes, it was a judicial victory. He never won the election, it was the judiciary that awarded him the victory. I am sure you know the history but if you want us to go through it. You see, after his judicial victory, we thought that as he had always been propagating, that he was going to make a difference in the governance of Osun State but we are saying that he is not different from what we know ACN government to be, simply a government of propaganda. It is a thing that really bothers me, it is a thing that saddens me that since Aregbesola has been in the saddle from November 2010, he has been putting Osun State in the news for wrong reasons. If he is not confronting the Federal Government, he does it with the judiciary. If he is not confronting the judiciary, it is the citizens of the state that he is confronting. Can you see what is happening in the state now? He has been busy demolishing people’s means of livelihood, he has been demolishing people’s property without compensation. That is not why he was put there as governor. He is supposed to protect the interests of the people. I make bold to say Osun is a rural state. You cannot compare Osun State with Lagos. Anybody who has chosen to govern Osun will have to evolve the local developmental policies of the people. You cannot import wholesale the programmes and policies of the Lagos State government. I am not surprised really because before he became the governor, Aregbesola had actually not been living among the people of Osun State. So, we are not surprised that since he has been in government, he has become an alien unto the people of Osun State because he doesn’t really know what he wants. He doesn’t know what our priorities are because he had never lived among the Osun people. Are you saying that there is nothing on ground since Aregbesola came into office? And still on your ambition, you seem to be confident. Do you think you will be able to match Aregbesola on the field in 2014? It is a well-known fact that come November this year, Aregbesola will be three years in office as the governor of Osun State. In the almost three years of Aregbesola’s administration, have you heard any project that he has commissioned? Have you read in the papers or seen it on television, or heard it on radio that he commissioned even one single project? That is number one. The only thing he did in terms of youth employment was to employ or select 20,000 youths that he was giving less than N10,000 every month, graduates whom he is using to cut grasses and clean sewages. My brother, I don’t believe that is the kind of job creation that the people of Osun are clamouring for. We are talking of real youth empowerment programme. Aregbesola has failed woefully because he said he employed 20,000 people, but anybody that lives in Osun will know that what we see on the streets everyday are not even up to 5,000. He employed these people and sowed uniforms for them, that is the only thing you can see. In terms of infrastructural development, have you seen any road that has been commissioned by Aregbesola in the last three years? In terms of health care, what facilities have you seen in rural health centres or have you seen any hospital that has been commissioned by Aregbesola? In the area of education, yes, he told us that he would be building mega schools, but what we saw was the destruction and demolition of 3,000 existing structures put in place by the previous administrations. He has not been able to commission any one of the mega schools. You don’t see any reason in removing old structures? Of course, over 3,000 schools were demolished by his own admission. They said they earmarked 4,000 schools to be demolished, that they had only got to 3000, that they demolished 3,000 with taxpayer’s funds. These were structures that were put there with public funds; he is using public fund to demolish them. Look my brother, if you want to build schools, like I said earlier on, Osun is a rural state with land in abundance, must you demolish structures before you build new ones? He demoilished 3,000 and he has not completed new one, he is going to three years of his administration. So, how many will he build in his four years? Tell me. Are you saying he has not commissioned any project since he came to power? He has not completed any. If you know, tell me now. If you know any road that Aregbesola has completed, please tell me. I hope you are not going to tell me about federal roads. I am from Osun, I live there with the people. I am telling you we have not seen a single one. So, in other words, what I am saying is that Aregbesola has failed woefully in terms of performance in Osun because he has nothing to show for the three years he has been in the saddle. People in Osun cannot be hoodwinked; they cannot be deceived for the second time. Aregbesola’s tenure is definitely over in the state because of woeful performance. It is only propaganda that we have seen. Another programme we have witnessed particularly in the media was the provision of computer tablets to secondary school students. What we have seen is the demonstration of the distribution of the materials to the students of one school in Osogbo. He distributed 385 computer tablets to one school in Osogbo and since the first year of his administration, we have been hearing that he was going to distribute the materials. And these are just for reading, an electronic device where textbooks are stored, so that instead of the students buying textbooks and all those things, they will use the electronic devise to read their text books. Concerning the PDP ticket, are you not concerned about the challenge of Senator Iyiola Omisore? I believe that out of the lot that have come out to show interest in the governorship of Osun State, I am the most qualified. I served this country in the highest lawmaking body, that is the Senate and also in terms of executive experience, I served this country as minister between 2007 and 2011. So, I believe that out of the lots that have come out to show interest on the platform of PDP, I am most the most qualified to occupy that office. I have told you I have the executive experience, I have the legislative experience, both will be deployed in the governance of Osun when we are given the mandate by the people. You continue to refer to Aregbesola as a governor appointed by the court... When the tribunal decided the case, it was in favour of the then incumbent, Olagunsoye Oyinlola. Then he (Aregbesola) went on appeal. I am sure you all know the intrigues. The case is still ongoing, Justice Salami’s matter should ring a bell in the hears of everybody . Now, before that election was awarded to Aregbesola, they had to remove a lot of votes. Elections in 10 local governments, including my own local government, were cancelled. We have 30 local governments areas in the state, they had to nullify elections in 10 local governments. That means 10 local governments did not have a say in who became the governor of the state. In addition to that, even out of the remaining 20 local governments, there was one area where voters were disenfrachised. What kind of democracy is that? What is going to happen is that you will be surprised because, apparently, you are still carried away by all this propaganda that the ACN people are known for. But the people of the state are the ones who know where the shoe is pinching them and they are the ones to decide who their next governor will be in 2014. It is not going to be you and those people who think like you. It is the people of Osun that will decide who governs them in 2014. But people already see the PDP platform as a weak one in Osun? I am telling you that PDP remains a family, we disagree and agree. Even before the emergence of Oyinlola, I want to tell you that 23 aspirants came out that they wanted to fly the flag of the party in that election against Bisi Akande that time. When the candidate emerged, everybody rallied round him. And this time around we are only four and I believe that the way PDP does its things democratically, once a candidate emerges, I don’t have any doubt that you know all the other aspirants will definitely support him in line with our tradition in PDP. PDP is not a one-man party. PDP, you know, is the largest party not only in Nigeria but in the whole of Africa. We do our things democratically. Every other aspirant will support whoever emerges as the candidate. Who is your godfather? Let me be honest with you, I don’t have any godfather. I only have role models. Every PDP leader is my godfather and I look forward to them, I respect them. I learn from them, I tap from their fountain of wisdom. So, every PDP leader is my godfather. You see, let me tell you this, I have told you that when President Umaru Yar’Adua was there, you all know that he dissolved his cabinet when he reappointed 20 out of 42, I was reappointed and reposted back to the Federal Ministry of Youth Development. How will the primaries of PDP go without any rancour? Like I said earlier on, PDP is not a one- man party. We have always been conducting our affairs democratically. I can assure you that the person who is going to fly the flag of the party to confront Aregbesola in 2014 will emerge democratically. That is where I am very confident because I know it is going to be on merit and I know that if it is on merit, Akinlabi Olasunkanmi is going to emerge as the candidate of PDP because of my experience. What is former Governor Oyinlola’s factor? You see, Oyinlola is one of the leaders of PDP in the sate, his factor is going to be like the factor of any other leader in PDP like Alhaji Shuaib Oyedokun, Chief Ebenezer Babatope, Dr. Olu Alabi, or Chief Olayinwola Ogunrinade. They will sit down together and what they have always been saying is that the people’s wish must prevail. I have absolute confidence in the leaders of our party in Osun state and nationally that they will allow the best candidate to emerge to face the incumbent governor. I don’t have any doubt about that. By 2014 when the governorship poll will take place in Osun State, other political functionaries on the platform of ACN, members of the House of Assembly, chairmen and councilors of local would still be in office. How do you intend to handle that if you are the candidate? I have already told you that the election is going to be decided by the people of Osun State. If they are satisfied with Aregbesola’s performance in office, definitely, they will vote for him. But if they are not satisfied with his performance in office and they don’t want their trauma to continue, I am sure he is going to be voted out. So,the election is not going to be decided based on propaganda, the election is going to be decided by the people of Osun State through one man-one vote. One woman-one vote, one youth-one- vote and there will not be room for all these para military organisations, illegal bodies that are being set up to perpetrate electoral violence. I am sure the election will be free and fair and the peoples vote will count. I am telling you if the votes of the people of Osun count in 2014, Aregbesola is going to be voted out because of the discontent of Osun people with his administration.. What would be the major trust of your administration if you emerge the governor? The major thrust of our programme is education and employment. Now, I have served at the Federal level at the Federal Ministry of Youth Development. Fortunately, we have National Youth Development Centre located in the state. We are going to make the youths to genuinely learn skills. vocational and entrepreneurship education, so that they will not only be useful to themselves, they will be useful also to the community and I am going to replicate in the first year in office, what we have there at the National Youth Development Centre in each of the three senatorial districts. We make sure that within one year, we have trained a good number of our youths in skills acquisition and entrepreneurship. We are going to train our youths massively, we are going to remove unemployment, cast it out from Osun State and there will be multiplier effects and I am very passionate about that. I have tried it at the federal level and I am going to replicate it as governor of Osun State in 2014. Has your zone produced the governor in the past? Let me tell that we believe so much in meritocracy. I know I have what it takes to govern Osun State. I believe that the best man should come out to give us good governance. My passion generally is, how can we drive out poverty, how can we wipe out hunger, how can we wipe out unemployment from Osun State? That is what I am bringing into government. Be that as it may, let me come back to your calculation. Oyinlola is from Central Senatorial District, the same senatorial district that Baba Bisi Akande came from. The two of them combined have governed Osun State for 12 years. The incumbent, Rauf Aregbesola, is from Osun East Senatorial District. What my people are saying is that it is now the turn of Osun West Senatorial District to be given the chance to govern Osun State. By accident of history, I happen to come from Osun West Senatorial District. Adeleke also came from Osun West Senatorial District but he only governed for 22 months. What are your strategies to defeat the incumbent in 2014? I feel bad, it touches my heart: people are going to the moon, they are even trying to devise a means of going to the sun, how they want to cool the system, people are advancing in technology every day, people are building the world into a global village. You can capture any picture and send it anywhere and we are talking of bringing dividends of democracy to our people, we are talking of how to entrench the system of good governance and yet you are saying somebody controls instruments of violence. It is really, really sad. I believe that we should all be the advocates of a very peaceful, transparent and credible election. Let me tell you that is what is making me to be very confident. I would never be associated with any violence, I will never associate myself with any malpractices because I have a name to protect and that is why I have said look, if you look at the pedigree of all of us that are vying on the platform of PDP, if you put us on a scale, and I have enumerated my pedigree for you, I am very, very confident. The PDP is an extension of this country, for God’s sake, we should get it right and I am very happy that the sitting president is doing a lot to stamp out violence in our electoral system; to stamp out malpractices in our electoral system and I am glad that I was part of that pioneering effort as a member of the former Federal Executive Council from 2007 to 2011. That is why I am sure that I am going to emerge because if you look at somebody who has the means, when I say means, I am not talking of money now, I am talking of the intellectual ability, I am talking of somebody who has the idea, I am talking of somebody who wants to serve the people genuinely devoid of propaganda, I am talking of somebody who will serve. You see, I served as a minister for four years, I am proud of that record, and I believe I want to deploy that intellectual ability in the service of our people in Osun State. That is the major thing God has endowed me with and that is what I am proud to present to present to the people of Osun State. I am ready to serve them at this level. модули joomla 2.5 Read 560 times
Posted on: Fri, 07 Jun 2013 07:15:59 +0000
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