Today marks the third anniversary of the Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola administration in the Osun State. OLAJIDE OMOJOLOMOJU takes a panoramic view of how the administration has fared in keeping with its promises to the people of the State of Living Spring.
The primary responsibility of any responsible government anywhere in the world is the general well-being and security of its citizens. This the Rauf Aregbesola-led All Progressives Congress, APC, administration in the State of Osun has held in high esteem as it has kept its promises with the people of the state.
The Osun’s experience in the spheres of infrastructural and human capital development in the last three years is worth applauding when compared to what Governor Aregbesola met on ground and what he has been able to do. Unusual happenings are unfolding in all sectors in the state, with the Aregbesola administration’s midas touch, which has completely transformed and changed the status of the state.
On inauguration exactly three years ago, Aregbesola pledged a friendly government that was totally committed to unlocking the latent potentials of Osun people. This promise he has kept. In the last three years, the educational sector of Osun has completely been transformed and its status changed.
The transformation in that sector was the outcome of the education summit spearheaded by renowned Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka and other stakeholders, convened by the current administration shortly after assuming the mantle of leadership of the state on November 27, 2010. Prior to the inception of the present administration in the Osun, public education had been so badly managed that only pupils whose parents could not afford the financial implications of private schools were left in the public schools.
The students, especially those in primary schools were roughly dressed and mal-nourished. School buildings were in dilapidated state, students’ performance both at the internal/external examinations were abysmally poor.
There were no instructional materials, while tuition fees in the state-owned tertiary institution was beyond reach of most Osun citizens. But today, some success stories are believed to have been recorded in the sector owing to some drastic steps taken by the government in solving the problems.
Steps taken to nip the rot in the education sector in the bud by the Aregbesola administration include: the provision of two pairs of unified school uniforms to each of 750,000 pupils in all the public primary and secondary schools across the state to boost the morale of the students and further promote unity among the public schools in the state at the cost of N800m; the injection of N1.8bn into the running of basic education in the state, including the provision of examination and running grants as well as education instructional materials for public schools; the injection of N30bn to give a new lease of life to the structures and classrooms under which pupils studied, whereby the state government is constructing 170 new model schools across the state to replace the dilapidated buildings with state of the art facilities expected to enhance and stimulate the teaching and learning environment.
Another remarkable feat in the sector was the introduction of the famous ‘Opon Imo,’ a tablet designed after the ipad, which contains the senior secondary syllabus, including Yoruba traditions and culture, past questions of the West African Examination Council, WAEC, National Examination Council, NECO and Joint Administration and Matriculation Board, JAMB.
Other innovations in the sector include the rejuvenated school feeding programme, tagged O’MEAL, reduction in the fees paid by students in all the five state-owned tertiary institutions, from N42,000 to N25,000 for those in polytechnics and colleges of technology and from N205,000 to N100,000, N155,000 to N75,000 and N130,000 to N75,000 for law and medical students, sciences students and social sciences and arts students respectively in the state university and the scholarship granted to 98 medical students of Osun State University for their clinical courses so as to complete their medical programme in far away Ukraine.
It is unarguable that Osun remains one of the few states in Nigeria which can be adjudged to be peaceful and with the lowest crime rates, simply because the Aregbesola’s government places high premium on security of lives and properties.
Believing that security engenders growth and development, the state government set up dedicated crime response team, nicknamed Swift Action Squad, SAS, now visible in strategic areas in the state as well as identified troubled sports.
Government also equipped this special squad with five Armoured Personnel Carriers, APCs and 25 patrol vans for surveillance. Government also constructed two state-of-the-art police stations and multi-force security control centre. Not done yet, additional 100 patrol vans were also to be provided for the SAS and seven more police stations to be built.
Currently, a state-wide distress management system, which would allow security agency to respond to distress calls within 40 minutes, is being developed so as to guarantee effective and efficient crime detection, prevention and control.
About 90 percent of the Nigeria’s over 150 million people are said to have been living below the poverty line. Aregbesola government’s response to this is a structural empowerment programme that targeted both the young and old. Among these intervention programmes are: Agba Osun: Over 1,600 vulnerable elders across the state have been selected through a comprehensive enumeration as beneficiaries of the state’s social security for the most vulnerable old people in the state. Each of these elders are placed on monthly stipend of N10,000 for their upkeep and forestall the ugly trend of these old people roaming the streets begging.
Mass empowerment of youths: With its first 100 days in office and in keeping with its promise, the Aregbesola administration employed 20,000 under the Osun Youth Empowerment Scheme, OYES, as volunteers for community service and placed on monthly stipend of N10,000 each.
Through OYES, about 5000 youths trained to acquire special ICT skills through the OYESTECH. Just last month, they all graduated with some of them employed by private organisations and some other empowered by government through soft loans to start their own business. The OREAP programme also empower 600 youths in the government’s agric enterprise academy as well as sponsored 50 youths to Germany to acquire advanced farming skills.
In order to improve the physical condition of urban areas of Osun State, the Aregbesola administration has provided N100 million counterpart fund to the UN-Habitat initiative, to explore the state’s urban renewal potential, and also focus on ruralurban developmental potential. Under this initiative, Osogbo, Ife, Ilesa, Ejigbo and Ikire, among others, have been earmarked for urban renewal by the state government.
With the payment of the state’s contribution of N100m last year, the UN-Habitat has agreed to give technical support in the area of effective deployment of a training programme, which will address areas like unsuitable urban growth, problems affecting the environment and growing inequalities between the rich and the poor and serious distortion in the form and functions of cities, among others. With its belief in the popular maxim: health is wealth, the Aregbesola administration is working to ensure that every citizen of the state should effortlessly have direct access to healthcare delivery.
To this end, government plans primary healthcare clinic within 10 kilometres radius of every Osun town with special attention to the needs of children, women and elderly; a functional general hospital within 20 kilometres radius of human habitation and referral hospital within 30 kilometres radius of human settlement.
All nine state-owned hospitals and 12 comprehensive healthcare centres have been rehabilitated for optimal functionality, easy access and quick service delivery, with the construction of additional 74 primary health centres across the state. Government has also carried out six medical and surgical missions to offer free treatment and surgeries to several thousand of citizens.
Apart from physical development, government has also focused on human capacity building in the health sector by empowering about 400 youths as paramedics to join the Osun Ambulance Service Authority.
Government has also embarked on the training and retraining of medical personnel with six of them on sponsorship to the University of Magdenburg Teaching Hospital, Germany. With the pervading peace and tranquillity in the state, Osun has become investment destination for potential investors, both local and international, who have also taken advantage of the veritable investment carrot dangled before them by the Aregbesola administration.
Dagbolu as a commercial hub is a midregional market for the entire South West. Situated less than five kilometres outside Osogbo, it is expected to be a logistic village where various warehouses would be specifically built for relevant investors and manufacturers so that their goods would be sold to the people of the state at the exact prices they are being sold at Oke Arin in Lagos, for instance, and other major markets in Lagos. There are also international markets for ready-made products.
Currently, Ayegbaju International Market, located at the old governor’s office and Aje International Market, sited at the state Trade Fair complex are examples of how the state government has been transforming Osun.
NATIONAL MIRROR

Pictures from the annual Sapara Williams Memorial Law Week, at Kings Centre, Governor Aregbesola was in attendance, the event held at Ilesa, State of Osun on Tuesday 26-11-2013

Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; President, Customary
Court of Appeal, Justice Glorial Olagoke and Chairman on the occasion,
Chief Felix Fagbohungbe (SAN), at the annual Sapara Williams Memorial
Law Week, at Kings Centre, Ilesa, State of Osun on Tuesday 26-11-2013

Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; President, Customary
Court of Appeal, Justice Glorial Olagoke; Chairman on the occasion, Chief Felix Fagbohungbe (SAN) and National 1st Vice President, Nigerian Bar Association, Chief Osas Erhabor, representing NBA
president, at the annual Sapara Williams Memorial Law Week, at Kings Centre, Ilesa, State of Osun on Tuesday 26-11-2013

Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; President, Customary
Court of Appeal, Justice Glorial Olagoke; Chairman on the occasion, Chief Felix Fagbohungbe (SAN) and National 1st Vice President, Nigerian Bar Association, Chief Osas Erhabor, representing NBA
president, at the annual Sapara Williams Memorial Law Week, at Kings
Centre, Ilesa, State of Osun on Tuesday 26-11-2013

Mrs Olubukola Oyawoye, the Osun Commissioner for Environment and Sanitation, said on Tuesday in Osogbo that the state government spent N2 billion in the last three years on dredging. Oyawoye stated this while fielding questions from journalists at a programme tagged News-Point, organised by the correspondents’ chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists in Osun.
The commissioner said the dredging was part of the Six-Point Integral Action Plan of Gov. Rauf Aregbesola’s administration. The aim of the plan is to banish poverty, unemployment and hunger from the state, as well as restore healthy living, enhance communal peace and promote functional education.
Oyawoye recalled how at the inception of Aregbesola’s administration in 2010, the government introduced measures to curtail flooding in all flood-prone areas. The commissioner said that as at 2012, the dredging covered 123 kilometres in more than 100 communities. The dredging of streams and rivers was carried out in Ipetu-Ijesa, Ife-Ilesa, Ejigbo, Iragbiji, Ode-Omu, Iwo, Ila-Orangun, and Osogbo.
In Osogbo alone, no fewer than 15 rivers, streams and canals, which include Okooko, Ogbaagba, Akepe, Odigun, Arungbo, Alekuwodo, are being dredged and de-silted on a continuous basis, according to the commissioner. “What we have spent in three years cannot equal what can be lost to flood disaster in one day. But since the inception of Aregbesola’s administration, we have not lost lives or property to flooding,” she said.
Oyawoye listed regular sanitation exercise, beautification project which involves tree planting in nine major cities, building of comfort stations as parks and public toilets as some of the achievements of the government.
(NAN)

Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola has reiterated his determination to eradicate poverty and further boost economy of the state by providing jobs for youths.
Aregbesola, while signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the International Breweries PLC to expand its business to employ additional 15,000 workers into its workforce, said the partnership is to motivate and encourage the company to retain its investment in Osun State.
The governor maintained that the state government would create an enabling environment for willing investors, adding that his administration has taken various steps to turn around the fortunes of the state economically.
He commended the management of International Breweries Plc for selecting Osun State for the investment, urging them to be involved in the backward integration for the benefit of those producing raw materials needed for production.
“The collaboration of the IB Plc will help to create about 150,000 direct and indirect jobs in the state. This will boost the economy of the state and the multiplier effect of this will reflect greatly on our economy,” he said.
Otunba Michael Daramola, IBL chairman lauded the efforts of Aregbesola’s administration in transforming the state and increasing the number of industries. Daramola noted that the development informed the decision of the company to expand its scope of operations in the state.
DAILY TRUST

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun State has congratulated Governor Rauf Aregbesola on his third anniversary in office.
In a congratulatory message, the party’s Interim Chairman, Elder Adelowo Adebiyi, described the Aregbesola administration’s achievements as “second to none” in the state’s history.
APC congratulated the people for having Aregbesola, “who is transformation personified and a trail blazer”, as their governor.
It said the administration’s three years in office have been “years of total transformation”, adding that Aregbesola has restored hope to the people.
APC said: “Aregbesola has brought hope to the state and restored its lost glory. He has made governance meaningful again to the people, who, for seven-and-a-half years, experienced maladministration, victimisation, underdevelopment and ill governance.”
The Chairman of the Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on Information, Segun Olulade, also congratulated Aregbesola.
In a statement, he said Osun, under Aregbesola’s visionary leadership, has recorded landmark achievements in the last three years.
Olulade said: “Osun people are the direct beneficiaries of good governance, under the visionary leadership of Rauf Aregbesola, and I congratulate them for choosing a leader that measures up to their aspirations.”
Olulade said the only way to sustain the development in Osun was to re-elect Aregbesola.
He said: “Without fear or favour, I confidently say that the Aregbesola administration has surpassed the expectations of the people in terms of road construction, youth development, education, agriculture and infrastructure, among others.”
THE NATION

By November 2010 when the administration of Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola took over the baton, Osun was barely a year less than two decades. What the entire state could boast of in internally generated revenue (IGR) in almost twenty years was no more than N300 million every month at the very highest. Records indicate it fell short of that many times.

However, by November 2013, a period of three years, by merely blocking all the leakages, Osun now rakes in N1.6bn in IGR monthly without expanding the tax net and the prospects are high and encouraging. What this indicates in clear terms, is that in all of its 19 years of existence as a state before the advent of the Aregbesola administration, Osun could muster a paltry N300million in what its people could contribute for its survival and continued existence. Conversely, in three years, the state grew its IGR by 433 percent.
Glimpsed from the perspective of this phenomenal growth, Nigerians are wont to go back to such statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics in terms of development indices to reason why Osun shows the highest capacity for outstanding growth in the whole country at the moment despite the unenviable 34th place in the revenue allocation ladder and meagre opportunities to generate funds internally.
The National Bureau of Statistics announced to the world that Osun ranks highest in public school enrolment in the country in a national environment where public school enrolment figures make very loud statements of the rot in the country’s education sector.
Within the same period and owing to the same factors, the National Bureau of Statistics placed Osun in the league of states with the lowest unemployment rate with the lowest figure of 3.0 where even Kwara ranks 7.1, Lagos ranks 8.3 and Oyo 8.9.
Of course, the obviously low crime rate in the state did not elude the observation of Participants of the Course 22 of the National War College Abuja which spent some days in the state on an assessment tour within the last two months.
All these indications of success cannot be happenstance. If anything, they represent the direct outcomes of ingenious, coordinated and determined interventions in the affairs of a state that was brought to its knees in all spheres of life.
In a country with mounting restiveness in all her regional parts, the Osun job creation specimen provides development experts fresh vistas of ideas to solve not only Nigeria’s but Africa’s bourgeoning unemployment predicament. That the World Bank adapted this model and presented it to the Federal Government culminating in the Youth Employment Social Support Operations, YESSO speaks volume about the Osun’s now established thinking out of the box.
Yes! The reforms in the education sector have brought about hoopla. But that is only to the very extent that humans must naturally resist change even when they are to transit from hell to paradise. This is coupled with the fact that the ever-opportunistic opposition camp, boxed to a corner and dazed by the chains of innovative projects, is poised to confuse the citizens with its dubious manipulative characterization.
Ranking Opon Imo, the Tablet of Knowledge among four best global learning tools by the United Nations-backed World Summit Award Global Congress strengthens the claim that from Osun has emerged “powerful solutions” to the problem facing quality education.
A combination of uninspiring learning environments, ill-motivated and unqualified teaching personnel, inadequately prepared curriculum and other problems had all conspired against quality learning.
If governance means responsibility to the people at all, the solutions proffered have addressed the roots of failure and ignited fresh passion for learning. The years to come are to confirm the ingenuity that lies in the solutions as examinations results are already indicating that the rot is disappearing.
Education sector
The Senate Committee on Education, led by Senator Uche Chukwumerije, did not just recommend the Osun education model for the entire country for nothing. There is no argument about the fact that Nigeria has lost its grip on the education sector with the concomitant huge costs to progress, order and development.
A large illiterate population readily promotes poverty, diseases, stagnation and violence. The Senate’s assessment of the Osun model and subsequent recommendations for national acceptance and adoption as a way out of the present conundrum is a powerful endorsement of the creative governance in the state.
The creativity resonates in tourism to attract people to Osun; it resonates in agriculture to cause massive food production; in youths engagements to re-orientate youth and create the new total man who is useful to his society. In environmental cares, the government has demonstrated a rare foresight in the management of its affairs that a hitherto uninspiring environment now greens with order and coordination.
It is also on record that this foresight made the state to stay afloat when many states of the federation came under the mercy of massive floods; a national catastrophe that had forced the Federal Government to belatedly spend billions of Naira to limit loses of lives and properties.
Just before the current administration took over, it was tragedy galore as flood swept humans and goods away even before the very eyes of those who had no solutions to society’s pressing problems.