In commemoration of this year’s International Monument and Sites Day, the management team and serving corpers in the Ministry of Information, Home Affairs, Tourism and Culture paid a courtesy visit
to the Palace of the Adagba of Iyanfoworogi and the Oduduwa groove both in Ile-Ife.
Speaking, the Adagba of Iyanfoworogi, Oba Adebolu Fatunmise Adegoke I called on the people not to neglect African beliefs and culture for the western religion saying culture is life and that culture is well established.
According to him, personality and culture are interwoven hence the Yoruba people have many deities led by the god called Olodumare while Ifa is the spiritual leader with his gift of prophecy to determine the destiny of the people.
Also speaking, the Obadio of Ife, Chief Farotimi Faloba at the Oduduwa Groove said the groove is the first palace of the Oduduwa as well as the first settlement.
Chief Faloba, who praised the governor of the State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola for his financial and spiritual support to make the groove more befitting and attractive to tourist also called on the government not to relent in ensuring that monuments and sites in Osun are well developed.
In her remarks, the Coordinating Director, Ministry of Information, Home Affairs, Tourism and Culture, Mrs Femi Webster Esho said the Governor, Ogbeni Aregbesola has not left anyone in doubt for his unalloyed support to the African belief and culture hence his administration has been magnanimous to tourism development
The Osun House of Assembly in Osogbo on Tuesday said it had received names of 39 nominees for Commissioners and Special Advisers from the state governor, Rauf Aregbesola.
Newsmen report that the Speaker of the assembly, Mr Najeem Salaam, read the letter from the governor on the list at the plenary session.The governor, in the letter dated April 11, urged the lawmakers to give the list of the proposed cabinet member’s speedy consideration.
The letter read partly, “Pursuant to Sections 192 (2) and 196 (2) of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), I have the honour to forward the list of nominees for consideration and confirmation by the house of assembly as Commissioners and Special Advisers”.
Newsmen recall that the governor had been without a cabinet since his inauguration for the second term on Nov. 27, 2014.
Among the nominees are Mr Kolapo Alimi, former commissioner, Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, and Mr Bashiru Ajibola, a former adviser, Special Duties.
Sen. Hussein Mudasiru, who represented Osun West Senatorial District between 2011 and 2015, also made the list. Other former commissioners on the list include Ms Mobolaji Akande, Human Resources and Capacity Building; Mrs Toun Adegboyega, Women and Children Affairs and Mr Ismail Jaiyeoba, Commerce, Cooperatives, Industry and Empowerment.
Former special advisers on the list include Kunle Ige, Community Development and Rural Affairs; Mr Bola Ilori, Environment; Mrs Latifat Giwa, Education and Dr Rafiu Isamotu, Health.
Others former special advisers are Mr Biyi Odunlade, Youths, Sports and Special Needs; Mr Bisi Odewumi, Local Government and Dr Olalekan Yinusa, Commerce and Cooperatives.
A former Chief Whip of the house of assembly, Mr Binuyo Ipoola and Assistant Chief of Staff to the governor, Mr Mudasiru Toogun, also made the list.
The assembly, also on Tuesday, screened 22 nominees for the Caretaker Committee Management for the 30 Local Government Areas (LGAs) and 31 Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs) in the state.
Newsmen recall that Aregbesola had in a letter dated April 6, sought for the consideration and confirmation of nominees as executive secretaries and members for the LGAs and LCDAs.
The letter was read by the speaker on April 10 at the plenary session. Salaam, however, said during the screening that any nominee who has yet to pay his or her tax to date would not be screened.
According to him, payment of tax is an important aspect of the screening.
Newsmen report that further screening will continue on Wednesday.
The Governor of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has submitted 39 names of Commissioners and Special Advisers to the State’s House of Representatives for confirmation. On Tuesday, the speaker of the state Assembly, Rt.Hon. Najeem Salam read the names of the nominees as sent by the governor, at the plenary, putting an end to speculations.
The 39 names as read from the letter of the governor, by the speaker include:
Arch.Akintunde Akinado
Mr Lani Badarinwa
Mrs Idiat Babalola
Mr Kolapo Alimi
Mr Olateju Muhideen
Mr Mudashiru Toogun
Mrs Latiffat Giwa
Mrs Kobolaji Akande
Mrs Toun Adegboyega
Dr Rafiu Isamotu
Mr Kunle Ige
Mr Bola Oyebamiji
Mrs Taiwo Oluga
Mr Korede Idowu
Mr Kola Omotunde Young
Mr Ismail Ademola
Senator Mudasiru Hussein
Mr Mikhail Adejare
Mr Ademola Adeyinka
Hon Ipoola Binuyo
Mr Ismail Jayeoba lagbada
Dr Olalekan yunusa
M Babatunde Ibirogba
Mr Femi popoola
Dr Mrs Yemisi akionla
Mr Remi Kolajor
Mr Bola ilori
Mr Tunde Ajilore
Engr Remi omowaye
Engr Kazeem Salami
Engr Afeez Oladede
Dr Adebisi Obawale Snr
Mr Bisi Odewumi
Mr Jimoh Gbenga Akano
Dr Olugbenga Oyinlola
Dr Bashiru Ajibola
Mr Gbenga Awosode
Mr Adeola Tejumola
Adeola tejumola
A special congress of the Nigerian Association of Women Journalists, NAWOJ, Osun State Council, comes up on Thursday, 20th April 2017 by 3pm.
A statement jointly issued by the Chairperson, Mrs. Toyin Adeoye and the Secretary, Funmi Adekoya indicated that the congress will take place at NUJ Press Centre, Iwo road, Osogbo.
The statement enjoined members to be punctual as the congress will be discussing the union’s forthcoming delegate
Congress/national election coming up in Edo State.
In a press release made available to newsmen by the Osun State Chairman of the Hope Democratic Party (HDP), Mr. Wole Adedoyin on Tuesday, he said the party has commended the Executive Governor of the State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola over the recent appointment of the state’s Local Government Caretaker Committee. The noble decision is a welcome development and a smart way of getting his party prepared for the 2018 election in the state.
Mr. Adedoyin however advised the State Governor to immediately constitute the state independent electoral committee who would organize masses-oriented local government election after the tenure of the just constituted local government caretaker committee.
Osun HDP Chairman who is also the Coordinator and Editor of Osun Redemption Group and 2018 Osun Guber Watch further urged the Governor to embark on people-oriented projects that will bring dividends of democracy to the individual citizenry of the State of Osun.
The party reiterates its support for the Osun State Independent National Electoral Commission in the ongoing Continuous Voters Registration Exercise. According to him, HDP is ready to assist Osun INEC in the area of Voters Registration, Engagement, Education and Mobilization. We have created Project VREEM as a way of mobilizing, sensitizing and enlightening Osun citizenry on why they must register and the benefits they will get after registration.
National Youth Service Corps, NYSC Osun State in partnership with Grace Project International have donated wheelchairs worth thousands of naira to three physically challenged persons in Ede.
Coordinator of NYSC in Osun state, Emmanuel Attahsaid the wheel chairs which was donated by Grace Project International was part of their contribution to NYSC in ensuring the actualization of institution’s social responsibility to the people.
‘’The three physically challenged persons are the first beneficiaries. It was designed to test and I want to assure you that the next beneficiaries will be more and would be distributed across the state.
‘’ This gesture is an attestation of the passion which the director general of NYSC, Brigadier General S. Z Kazaurehave in developing not only the corps members, staff, but also the various communities where corps members are posted to serve their fatherland.
Attah who represented the NYSC director general said that the choice of Ede as the first beneficiary was not a coincidence, but a deliberate effort in that Ede is where the NYSC orientation camp is located.
The DG, however, called on the host communities to continue to support NYSC scheme and to see the corps members as their own children. Noting that NYSC will continue to develop the various communities in the state and impact on the people positively.
Oba of Ede, MuniruAdesholaLawal said yesterday during the ceremony that he was excited as his domain is the first to benefit from the gesture.
The leader of the Hausa Community in Ile-Ife, Alhaji Mahmuda Abubakar Madagali, has once again appealed to all concerned to exercise patience and allow the Honourable Justice M.A. Adeigbe’s seven-member panel on the recent Ile-Ife crisis complete its assignment and submit its findings to the Osun State government for prompt implementation.
The Sarki Hausa, Ile-Ife told Palace Watch that the preoccupation of the Hausa community in Ile-Ife is to do profitable businesses and not create crises. He said they have lived among the Yoruba people for centuries, and that they are ready to be law-abiding in the overall interest, peace and progress of Ile-Ife, which has given them the opportunity to earn their living in a very peaceful atmosphere for so many years now.
How far has the Honourable Justice Adeigbe’s committee gone with its assignment?
I honestly can’t say how far they have gone with their work. I have been very ill; I was just discharged from the hospital on Monday. Nevertheless, I have people, including lawyers, representing our interest. I am confident that they have so far done a very good job.
I am also very satisfied with the steps so far taken by Governor Rauf Aregbesola in this matter. He is a good man and, indeed, a true Muslim. I pray that we shall all meet in paradise Insha Allah. As far as I know, with his pro-activeness and actions, the Hausa Community in Ile-Ife is presently at peace. We do not have any headache, as far as this matter is concerned. We have moved on with our lives.
Secondly, due to the unbiased stand of Governor Aregbesola since this unfortunate incident happened, all the injured Hausa people and those still on admission in the hospital have no reason(s) to be anxious, because they all know their security is guaranteed. We have, therefore, resolved that whenever we are praying for ourselves, we will also continue to pray for the governor, the leaders and people of Ile-Ife in general.
I must confess that we do not have any problem with the majority of Ile-Ile people. We have lived here long enough to know how to respect their customs and tradition, as well as respect them as a people. It is the few bad ones among them that caused this problem. I hope and pray that we get over it very soon and quickly, too.
Has the panel concluded its assignment?
I am not quite sure about that. But when I was briefed this morning, I was told that the panel has visited the scene of the incident alongside the victims, who are alive and some in the hospital. I was told the panel has also given nine days for people with any claims or advice to give with regards to the unfortunate incident to come and do so. The panel initially gave seven days for this, but that date expired last Tuesday. So, it was extended to last Monday. I have spoken to most of our people who were affected, and they have told me that they have got lawyers, who assisted them in putting their claims on record before the panel.
After this very painful incident, how secure is the Hausa Community in Ile-Ife?
As far as I know as a Muslim, nobody can honestly guarantee the security of another person, except Allah. But as far as I know, major efforts have been made to ensure that we go about our businesses safely. This, we are very grateful about. Presently, it is not only the Osun State Police Command that is maintaining peace and security in and around these areas; they are also being assisted by some detachments from Ondo and Oyo States. They are all under the command of the Assistant Inspector-General Police in Charge of zone eleven.
I must confess that the state government has done very well in this regard.
We are, however, very worried about some people who were not anywhere near here, when this very unfortunate incident happened. They are, today, alleging all manner of things, which are not correct. My appeal once again is for us to be patient and allow this panel to complete its assignment and give government the opportunity to act on whatever recommendation it will submit. On our part, we will abide by the findings of the panel, once it is done in good faith, justly and honestly. Nobody will gain anything from crisis; we are not at all ready for that. No matter what anybody might say, Governor Aregbesola has been honest and firm. This is the type of leader Allah wants in very high positions. He has done his very best, and has taken all the necessary actions in a situation like this. He has asked us to be calm, that no matter what justice will be done, and we believe him.
Governor Aregbesola went a step further by telling us point-blank that if there is anybody amongst us, who is known to be fomenting trouble, we should not hide such a person. We should report such a person(s) to the appropriate authorities. And this we are ready to do. This is how far he has gone as the state chief security officer in ensuring that there is peace again in Ile-Ife. People should, therefore, stop accusing Aregbesola of taking sides in this matter.
The excitement reached a head, as the party hit the November 27 interchange, that flies over Gbongan road, in Osogbo.
He was no yokel; but in his excitement, prancing and skipping, he yodelled like one.
“Ogbeni, the Awolowo of our time,” he chirped, “don’t forget the Bisi Akande trumpet!” — and, all zeal and fervency, he pointed towards Gbongon.
The Bisi Akande Trumpet Bridge was some 40 kilometers away, at the old Gbongan junction, with Ibadan-lfe expressway. But this enthusiast couldn’t imagine Osun Governor, Rauf Aregbesola, letting go of his Guild of Editors guests, without showing off his architectural wonder.
It was March 18. The Guild of Editors chose to hold its committee meeting at Osogbo. The governor also seized the occasion to show the elite of the Nigerian media Osun’s developmental strides. Though Ripples is no member of the Guild, he was invited to join the August visitors in March.
The bussed company, with the governor himself in-situ, set out, from the Oke Fia Government House, quietly enough.
But they lost their anonymity that moment, at the Olaiya junction of Alekuwodo, in Osogbo’s commercial hub, someone sighted the governor, and let go a yelp.
Before you knew it, an excited, beaming, dancing company was pumping fists and flashing “V” (for victory) signs, with their two fore-fingers, a sign original to Winston Churchill, Britain’s World War 2 hero; but popularized in these climes by Chief Obafemi Awolowo, first premier of the old Western Region.
The governor, himself a study in boyish excitement, returned the “V” compliment; and an impromptu carnival of love, mutual doting and appreciation ensued. As the convoy rolled slowly by, on the newly named Workers Avenue, so did the excited people swell in their numbers.
But everything got to a head on the November 27 bridge, when the governor and his entourage disembarked, the accompanying officials explaining the work-in-progress; and the governor himself chipping in now and then, especially the engineering and technical details.
The first leg of the tour was on the Oba Adesoji Aderemi ring road, that ripples with history, old and contemporary.
Oba Aderemi (1889-1980), was Ooni of Ife (1930-1980); and was first indigenous governor of Western Region, during which time Chief Awolowo, as Premier, performed his social transformation wonders, that hauled the old West clear of the other regions, of North and East.
But, as Oba Aderemi offers today’s Osun a symbolic tieback to the Awolowo golden age, so does its 17.5-kilometre stretch project, to a future Osun, clear historical landmarks.
Those monuments capture its infrastructural remake, from a backwater “civil service” state that rose and fell by Abuja’s dole; to a land poised to harness its resources, in the finest tradition of the Yoruba Omoluabi.
It is a classic case of history meeting the historic-minded.
Those monuments? Four bridges, really.
Five Judges, to commemorate the five Court of Appeal justices, whose verdict reclaimed the Aregbesola mandate, after almost a four-year struggle; November 26, the day that judgment was given; November 27, when the first Aregbesola administration birthed, and August 9, the day the governor won re-election, despite the hideous plots to skew the vote, by the Jonathan Presidency, flush with success in a similar gambit in Ekiti.
By design or by accident, November 27 and Bisi Akande Trumpet bridges appear the grandest of the signature road projects, wrapped in political symbols, that would in history, define the developmental temper of the Aregbesola years.
Bisi Akande immortalizes Osun’s very first attempt at serious governance (1999-2003), since its creation in 1991.
But that attempt was scuttled, during the Obasanjo South West electoral tsunami of 2003. November 27, on the other hand provided a doughty root for August 9, that day in 2014 the Osun local forces trumped illicit “federal might” to renew Aregbesola’s mandate.
The rest of the project tour, the Osogbo Government High School, one of the 11 avant-grade public schools springing up in different locations of the state; and the Nelson Mandela Freedom Park, Osogbo, are no less impressive symbols of developmental governance.
But the Mandela Freedom Park offers something somewhat novel — an informal museum of leisurely history. Mingling with park seats, on close-cropped lawns, is a special section bearing busts of Titans of the progressive politics of the West, from different ages: Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Chief Bola Ige, Chief Bisi Akande and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
Yet, another section of mini-galleries, boasts marble plaques, that encapsulate the tenure of every Osun governor, military or civilian, from Col. Leo Segun Aborisade, the first governor (military administrator) to Aregbesola himself. So, as loungers relax, they can read up their history and civics.
Dominating the park landscape is the impressive Atewogbeja Fountain, a tribute to the Osun river and its trove of fresh-water fishes. The fountain waters are electrically programmed, at night, to tumble down in a rainbow of colours.
Incidentally, the tour ended at Olaiya junction, with the unending tryst between an appreciative people and their governor!
From the tour revelations, Osun, of the Aregbesola years, would appear in a flux of rapid change; to justify the Heraclitean quip: you can’t step in the same river twice! Indeed, Osogbo had come a long way from the old rural town, to a growing modern city, gradually holding its own in serenity and winning infrastructure, drawing new businesses across different sectors.
So has Osun shrugged off its laggardness to, despite its puny resources, point the way in the schools feeding programme, which the Federal Government just adopted on a national scale.
Surely then, the Aregbe legacy is assured, came what may? Not exactly.
Indeed, Osun is painfully poised at a critical juncture between the short-lived but enduring Western Renaissance under Awo, before the SLA Akintola Demo forces blighted everything; and the post-1999 Lagos of sound developmental governance and golden continuity, which has become a national reference.
You could feel palpable panic, the way some Osun conservatives, in concert with Yoruba irredentists, tried to mould themselves into emergency Yoruba warriors against phantom Hausa-Fulani threat, when the Ife disturbance was nothing but mutual criminality.
The Afenifere veterans that dived into bed with Femi Fani-Kayode’s subversive Yoruba nationalism would appear splashing in the Osun political river, panic-stricken that, after the Aregbe years, so much has changed you can’t step in the same river twice.
So is Iyiola Omisore, with his trademark spew of verbal rot, perhaps gripped with the fear that, with the balance of forces, he might just be graduating, from serial failure to veteran failure, in his quixotic gubernatorial quest.
Still, that would appear no done deal. Even as Heraclitus declared nature was in a flux, Parminides, his Greek contemporary, countered nature was static and unchanging! That contradiction could give the conservatives some hope, no matter how tenuous.
So, Osun could well be changing; but maybe not rapidly enough to banish that 2003 electoral ghost, that traded solid gold for glittering tinsel. For that, the state paid a stiff price in hideous stagnation, in the dreadful pre-Aregbe years.
However it goes, Aregbesola’s personal legacy, like Chief Awolowo’s before him, appears secure.
But not the Osun developmental fate, ironically again, like the old West, where Awo wrought wonders only for the Demo renegades to blight everything.
Osun’s best bet, therefore, is a post Aregbe-era of stellar developmental strides, anchored on present efforts. That way, Osun may yet emerge the ultimate development wonder of the 4th Republic, just as the old West was the 1st Republic’s.
Ay, Lagos holds that honour now. But even the most doting of Lagosians would admit the post-1999 Tinubu movement (which incidentally Aregbesola was part of) only re-engineered a decaying former federal capital. Osun, under Aregbe, never had such a head start.
But the threat to Osun enjoying a Lagos-like golden continuation, and not enduring the old West’s reactionary roll-back, would appear to lie less with the Osun conservatives, no matter how desperate they may be, but with the governor’s own internal foes, craving pork but pretending all is cool.
That is the direction to address, if Aregbe must, like Tinubu in Lagos, get the successor(s) to further entrench Osun’s unfolding renaissance.