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The Government of the State of Osun has said it will do everything possible to support farmers to ensure abundant food production in the state.
Dele Ogundipe, the Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Quick Impact Intervention Programme (QIIP), said this on Saturday in Osogbo.
He said the government would continue to support the Piggery Farmers’ Association to ensure abundant meat production. He also urged pig farmers to support the state government’s vision toward improved food production to reap more gains.
According to him, the support would enable the farmers to enjoy QIIP loans through the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security.

Ogundipe revealed that the state government had started Artificial Insemination (AI) of female pigs in the three senatorial districts of the state, saying the government spent huge amount of money on the exercise.
He advised pig farmers not to see the business as a way of boosting food production only, but as a job and wealth creation venture.
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Chief (Mrs) Grace Tomori-Laoye, Dep Gov and Commissioner for  Education, Osun State

Chief (Mrs) Grace Tomori-Laoye, Dep Gov and Commissioner for  Education, Osun State
The government of the State of Osun has rewarded one Mrs Christianah Opeyemi Adeloye, a Part Two medical student of University of Ibadan, who came first in 2011/2012 Joint Admission Matriculation Examination Board (JAMB) in Nigeria.
According to the deputy governor of the state, who also doubles as the State Commissioner for Education, Otunba (Mrs) Grace Laoye-Tomori, at a short ceremony in honour of the recipient in her office in Osogbo, “Miss Adeloye has done the State of Osun proud, as she towered above all the candidates, who sat for 2011/2012 Joint Admission Matriculation Examination Board in Nigeria.”
She added that the recipient had imbibed the culture of Omoluabi, which the people of the state are noted for by excelling in her academic pursuit.
The deputy governor added that Professor Akinyinka Omigbodun made case for the recipient, as the state government was not aware of her feat.
In her word: “We did not know that you’re an Osun indigene, as you did not school in our state, but I want to assure you that now our public schools in the state are fit for academic excellence, as we’ve upgraded our schools and they are better-equipped for academic work”.
She also commended the parents of the recipient for the moral and financial support which made her to excel among her colleagues.
The deputy governor then used the occasion to call on all Osun indigenes to patronize public schools in the state, as the government of Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has overhauled the education sector to compete favourably with any first class standard school in any advanced country.
In his message of gratitude to the government of the State of Osun, the father of the recipient, Evangelist Emmanuel Adeloye, a leader of Celestial Church of Christ in Ilaro, Ogun State, commended the effort of the state government for implementing its six-point integral action plan, which had turned the fortune of the state within a short time.
He added that the state indigenes all over the federation are proud of the current administration in the state and also support its laudable programmes and policies. Adeloye therefore, prayed for God’s guidance and protection over the governor and the state as a whole.
Present at the deputy governor’s office during the presentation was the Secretary to the State Government, Alhaji Moshood Adeoti, Special Adviser to the Governor on Education, Honourable Niyi Idowu, the Permanent Secretary of the State Ministry of Education, Mr Olayinka and the parents of the recipient.
OSUN DEFENDER

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Internally Generated Revenue: Osun’s Quantum Leap


RAUF

From a paltry N300 million a month less than three years ago to N1.6 billion now, internally generated revenue (IGR) in the State of Osun will appear to have taken a quantum leap.
This, of course, cannot be in absolute terms. Compared to Lagos that now does no less than N15 billion a month and is set to hit the N20 billion mark, N1.6 billion monthly seems small. But the news is not Osun’s present IGP in absolute terms. It is even not its comparison with Lagos, brother states they may be.
The news is rather about where Osun was coming from, and the strides it has made, less than three years, under a government that is focused and which nevertheless inherited a near-paralytic infrastructure from a previous government, which was in power for more than seven years.
Indeed, it is from this standpoint of near hopelessness in government that the Osun current IGP triumph must be viewed and celebrated. The Aregbesola administration has done well. So it is kudos to the governor and his team.
But as the reward for hard work is even more hard work, they must know that it is only a sweet beginning. They should therefore also aim at an even sweeter ending. From their performance these three years past, they are well positioned to doing it. They must grab this historic opportunity to make a difference and modernize Osun for good.
Still, what is responsible for this near-meteoric rise in Osun IGP? Some say it is sounder husbandry of Osun resources. This cannot be wrong. To assume office under those debilitating circumstances and yet engage 20, 000 youth volunteers under the Osun Youth Employment Scheme (OYES) was well and truly amazing. Now, to see the second batch of OYES literarily fall upon their jobs, menial as it is, even with their educational attainments, shows a positive improvement in the collective ethos of Osun people.
Still on good husbandry of state resources, that the Aregbesola government has embarked on massive infrastructure and urban renewal programmes, the most extensive and ambitious in the history of the State of Osun, is well and truly breath-taking.
It almost sounds as if the state is experiencing positive spiritual pay back: it is as if the state is getting compensated, in arrears and on the double, for past misrule that had resulted in stagnation. In all sectors of the Osun economy – education, health, agriculture, roads, environment and rural development, just to name a few – something new is happening.
Even in commerce, something big is about to happen with the impending launch of the standard measure for grains, to further instill the ethos of honesty and integrity in the Osun market folk.
This development is intended to make Osun the hub of commerce, between the South-West and the northern parts of the country, where in Osogbo, products and produce can be bought at Lagos prices.
That in itself would reclaim the old glory of the railway-linked Osogbo as a commercial nerve, next only to Ibadan and Lagos in the old Western Region. So, from an economic backwater which inhabitants groan with moans and regret, Osun, with its futuristic infrastructure under construction, is on its way to being a competitive player on the economic front.
But while doing all these, the government is also building its tax base. Indeed, the climb in IGP, aside from good resource husbandry, is also due to taxable economic activities. The more people witness upswing in facilities, the more they are convinced to pay tax.
The more tax payable, the greater the possibility of higher IGP and even more facilities. This economic growth, other things being equal, in due course translates to development and development itself translates to prosperity.
The Osun rags-to-riches story in IGP only proves that a government can only boost its taxable earnings only if it invests in its own economy by boosting infrastructure: physical (in the short run) and social (in the medium and long run). That is why Nigeria’s curious federalism of ‘revenue allocation’ makes nary any economic sense.
Even with its puny resources, the Aregbesola government has proved the almost limitless possibilities of the Osun economy. But it is early days yet. The government should continue on these winning lanes. That is the logical and reasonable path to socio-economic development.
OSUN DEFENDER

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Aregbesola Congratulates Victorious Golden Eaglets

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The Governor of the State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has congratulated the national Under 17 football team, the Golden Eaglets, for winning the 2013 edition of the FIFA under 17 World Cup in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) after thrashing their Mexican counterparts 3-0 in the final played in Abu Dhabi on Friday.
In a release from the Director of the Bureau of Communications and Strategy, of the Office of the Governor, Semiu Okanlawon, Governor Aregbesola also congratulated President Goodluck Jonathan; the Minister of Sports, Bolaji Abdullahi; Nigerian Football Federation (NFF); the players; the coaches and other officials that made the feat possible and everyone that had a hand in the team’s success.
According to him, the players, a microcosm of Nigerian heterogeneity, demonstrated the Nigerian spirit of aspiration, dedication and triumph over obstacles to defeat the other strong and formidable teams they encountered along the way.
This, he said, is a clear demonstration of what Nigerian youth can do under the right leadership.

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Come Wednesday 27th of November, 2013, the administration of Ogbeni Rauf Adesoji Aregbesola will be three years in the saddle of government of the State of Osun.
In these three years, what has the governor been able to achieve? What do the people think or feel about this government? Positive or Negative?
The people spoke their minds to some reporters recently and indeed, they had a lot to say about the governor and how his administration has affected Osun.
Sosan Moses (PZ Staff)
To some extent, he has done immensely well with his new innovative ideas; Osun Youth Empowerment Scheme (OYES) and other infrastructural programmes. So far, so good, Ogbeni has not done badly.
Oluwaseun Tanimola Salahu (Entertainer) 
Progress and peace have come to be permanent feature of the State of Osun under this current dispensation and to me, that is commendable.
Youth empowerment and improvement in Osun education sector because of the new school restructuring policy have also become the hallmark of the Aregbesola administration.
That is a good thing and I am happy it is happening at our own time.
The governor is the right man for Osun, but he should focus more on the state’s economy and encourage people to enrol for technical education, because that was what Malaysia and other countries did and today, they are better for it.

Muhammad Abdulkabir (Paramilitary Officer)

The man is our Messiah in the State of Osun. Ogbeni is the best governor we ever had in the history of the state.
I will just mention 35 out of his achievements that made him the best governor in the history of the state.
1. 40,000 youths employed under the Osun Youth Empowerment Scheme (O’YES)
2. 5,000 Youths trained and empowered in information communication technology under the Osun Youth Empowerment Technology (O’YESTECH)
3. Over N2.4 billion injected into the economy as allowances for the OYES Volunteers
4. 123 kilometres of waterways (streams, arteries and canals) dredged to keep the state flood-free for three years
5. 750,000 school students provided with free school uniform coupled with empowerment of 3,000 tailors 6. 150,000 students provided with computer tablets (Opon Imo), an electronic learning tool preloaded with 17 subjects, 54 textbooks, and past questions of JAMB, WAEC AND NECO of the past 10years.
7. Introduction of bi-monthly environmental sanitation exercise under the O’CLEAN initiative to keep the state clean.
8. Beautification of the 185 Km Oyo Boundary (Asejire) to Osun-Ondo Boundary (Owena)
9. Trucks provided for a Public-Private Partnership waste management model in the state.
10. Primary School Funding Grants increased from N7.4 million to N424 million a year.
11. 240,000 children feed daily with nutritious meals under the Osun Elementary School
Feeding (O-MEAL) and Health Programme coupled with empowerment of over 3,000 caterers
12. Secondary School basic funding grants from N171 million to N427 million per year.
13. Tuition fees in State-owned tertiary institutions reduced by 30%.
14. Security of lives and properties being guaranteed with provision of 5 Armoured Personnel Carriers, over 100 security patrol vehicles and one helicopter for area surveillance.
15. 2 state of the art police stations built.
16. Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) increased from N300 million to N1.6billion without
increasing tax payable by citizens.
17. Setting up of Omoluabi Conservation Fund with a N4.2 Billion reserve.
18. Osun Debt Management Office established.
19. Building of the largest commercial apiary in Sub-Saharan Africa for refined honey production.
20. Over 1,765 hectares of land cleared and prepared to support farmers.
21. Rehabilitation of farm settlements in the state.
22. Over N1 billion committed to the support of farmers.
23. Building of super highways to connect Osun to Lagos and Osun to Kwara states.
24. 61 Township roads covering 128km are being upgraded all over the state
25. Ede Water Works capacity increased from 13% to 30% and plans on-going to reach 100% capacity before the end of 2013.
26. Over 3,000 permanent teachers employed into the state education sector.
27. 218 km roads being built across the 30 local government areas and Ife East Area Office, Modakeke.
28. Osun Ambulance Service Authority established with 400 youths trained as paramedics.
29. 9 State Hospitals and 12 Comprehensive Health Centers being rehabilitated and refurbished in the state; 74 Primary Health Centers built.
30. Construction of Freedom Park, the first of its kind in the history of the State of Osun.
31. Omoluabi Garment Factory employed up to 3000 people in the State of Osun.
32. Free rail service to all indigenes of the State of Osun living in Lagos State.
33. With just a few I have mentioned that Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has done, you will all agree with me that our governor is an unusual governor.
34. Payment of salaries to old people in the State of Osun referred to as Agba Osun.
35. O-Mediation; to settle disputes between people in the state and increase in bursary from N2000 to N10000 to all the students in tertiary institution from the State of Osun.
Onigbogi Jibola Tokunbo (Ward 3, Ilesa-West LG)
Well, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has been faithful and sincere with his promises. He has touched everyone
OSUN DEFENDER

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Children’s Survival Must Concern Any Responsible Govt, Says Aregbesola


Governor, State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has said that the survival of children must be of utmost concern to any responsible government. Flagging off the state Integrated Measles Campaign and Maternal Neonatal Child in Osogbo, the state capital, the governor said the joy of any woman was not only to give birth to a baby but to see him or her live and grow up to become somebody in life. Describing measles as a life-threatening disease which kills children at their infancy, he noted that the children of today are the future of the state and the country.
“Measles is a killer disease. And it is the enemy of children.It attacks and kills children at infancy. This government is concerned about the children because they are our tomorrow. As the government, we will do everything humanly possible to protect our children. “And today we are happy that the secret and formidable weapon against this preventable killer disease is the vaccine. It is cheaper for government to control this disease through vaccination than any other means. Our government, therefore, will do everything possible to make the vaccine available for the sole purpose of weaning our children from measles,” Aregbesola said.
Speaking earlier, the Commissioner for Health, Dr. Temitope Ilori, said measles is the highest killer of all vaccine preventive diseases.

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MRS ILORI

MRS ILORI
The Government of the state of Osun is set to collaborate with a leading network, Civil Society in Malaria, Nutrition and Immunization (ACOMIN) with the aim of preventing, treating of malaria, and promoting immunisation and better nutrition among the people of the state.
Speaking with members of the executive of ACOMIN, a non-governmental organisation, when they paid her an advocacy visit, the state Commissioner for Health, Dr. (Mrs) Temitope Ilori disclosed that her ministry would carry the network along especially in the area of immunization and nutrition.
While emphasizing the need for parents and guardians in the state to ensure that their wards are immunised at government health centres across the state, Dr. Ilori disclosed that health ministry is a multi-sectional sector which should not be left to the ministry alone.
Ilori therefore noted that the door of her ministry is always open to organizations that are ready to collaborate with the government in order to eradicate malaria and other related diseases thus advising parents to cease the opportunity and ensure immunisation of their children.
Speaking earlier, the state Chairman of ACOMIN, Mr. Aremu Akinyele said that the vision of ACOMIN established in March, 2006 with the technical assistance of Federal Ministry of Health is to create a healthy Nigerian society free of preventable and communicable diseases.
Expressing concern over what he described as laxity on the part of most parents to ensure that their wards under five years are immunised, Akinyele maintained that members of the public need to be sensitised on the dangers of eating unbalanced diet.
Akinyele however lauded the gesture of the state government to collaborating with the network pledging that ACOMIN would do all it can to ensure that malaria is reduced to its barest minimum saying that ACOMIN has many experienced professionals to enable it achieve this fit.
GAZELLE NEWS

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WalkApomu-3

The Governor, State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola and his Deputy, Mrs Titi Laoye-Tomori, leading other State Executives including his wife, Sherifat and people of Irewole, Isokan and Ayedade Local Governments area of the State, at the 13th edition of Walk to live at Apomu, State of Osun on Saturday 09-11-2013
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Aregbesola-Rauf1-600x800
Contrary to misinformation spewed in the public domain, the missionaries do not own, manage or fund the only girls’ schools in the State. Since the 1975 take-over of the schools by the government, over 100 schools were built by the Baptist Convention without any as a single sex school.
Perhaps, there is the need to pierce the religious mask given to the agitation. In essence, there is an urgent need to appraise the past. What was the state of education as directed by the predecessor of Aregbesola? A cursory check shows that most public schools then were P.T.A-run. It was the parents’ body that employed teachers for the schools, most of whom were secondary school graduates. They were paid N7,000 (seven thousand naira) as salaries and classically called ‘P.T.A-teachers’. Parents provided chairs and tables for their children to use at schools.
Most often, for the lack of security, the pupils carried the chairs on their heads in the morning to their respective schools and to their homes after closing hours in the afternoon. The parents also had certain amounts they contributed to the schools as development fees. The contributions of the then government were one or two blocks of buildings of low standard in each schools and the payment of salaries to a handful of regular staff. Since there was no provision for toilets or latrines, the pupils eased themselves around the school compounds. By the time the government was packing its bag and baggage in 2010, after seven and half years in the saddle, most of the buildings had become dilapidated and the school surroundings were in total shambles.
But the odour of the putrid degeneracy in the education then was probably not strong enough to spring the Christian and Muslim communities into the kind of actions they have engaged in recently. Notwithstanding, it is a common knowledge that during that time, while public schools were festering like a sore thumb, the private schools, though very expensive, were blossoming like the fertilized flowers. Thus, the proprietors of these schools then smiled to the banks with their windfalls. Sadly enough, there was no agency or body to supervise and monitor their low quality and poorly paid secondary graduate ‘teachers’ that they exploit to teach the innocent pupils. Therefore, it was a ding dong case of ‘you rub my back and I rub yours’ between the government and the private school owners.
I am sensing, possibly, that the sin of Aregbesola is that he has come with the determination, never seen in any previous government in the state, to salvage the educational system of the State. Initially, it was dismissed as a joke of the political soapbox. But when they started seeing buildings rising up with modern facilities, they became jittery of what would become of the fate of their own private schools. The governor is now seen as a man possessed with a strange spirit that has to be exorcised.
But there are other sins of the governor. He is not just a Muslim but a devoted one in look and nature. His government was the first (and the only one so far) to have declared Hijra as a public holiday for the Muslims. This earned him all sorts of names from a Muslim fundamentalist to a Taliban and Boko Haram. And the Christians declared that he came with the agenda to turn Osun into an Islamic State.
The governor, however, had not finished yet. He further declared a public holiday known as Isese day for the traditional religious practitioners. The Muslims, who had earlier commended him for recognising their “New Year day” pitched an uncommon tent with their Christian counterparts and labelled him a babaalawo (herbalist) and an occultist. In a similar vein, school uniforms distributed freely to students has ELLA (Education and Learning Leading to Accomplishment) as the label of the school uniform; the cry was that the children wearing the clothes would become victims of money rituals.
Equally, Aregbesola remains the only governor to have accorded traditional religion practitioners an equal leverage to operate. (That is understandable in a State that can be rightly described as the cradle of Yoruba race and traditional beliefs.) Today they have more courage to be proud of their chosen faith. Despite the high level of disenchantment and no love lost between the Christians and Muslims, they have always found a common, hypocritical ground when it comes to condemning traditional religion. Meanwhile, the sermon of the governor is that religious tolerance is when a thousand flowers of religions can blossom together. And that the sky is wide enough for the millions of birds to fly together without any clash. No wonder, there has never been a reported case of a religious clash in the State of Osun.
Life can be so ironical when one looks at what a genuine leader has to pass through in bringing a progressive change to his society. As a leader, who is committed to education, Aregbesola sent about 98 medical students to Ukraine to continue their medical programme. These students became victims of the Osun State University, established without any provision for their clinical training. No university was prepared to accept them for the requisite training. Hence, their fate was left hanging until Aregbesola assumed office in 2010. He could have ignored them and denied ever been the cause of their predicament.
Aregbesola, who is called an Islamic fundamentalist, donated millions of Naira to Baptist Convention during its 2013 convention in the State of Osun; gave N10 million to Osun CAN and provided N35 million for the burial of late Prophet Abraham Obadare, the former General Overseer of WOSEM. All spent from the taxes of the hardworking payers.
Each time I reflect on all this, what comes to my mind is the song of the musical maestro, Ebenezer Obey, in his record titled the ‘The Horse, The Man And His Son’. He opines in this record that no matter how wise you are, you can never satisfy human beings. But what is important is that you are serving the good of the generality of your people to the best of your conscientious ability.
What Aregbesola has brought to Osun is a revolution without bloodshed. But what has been realised is that, revolution, whether bloody or non-violent, must have its resisters. The only thing that does not resist itself is change itself. Concluded

Amusan writes from Lagos
PEOPLE’S DAILY

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Jefferey Hawkins, Consul-General of the U.S. in Nigeria, on Friday in Osogbo said no fewer than 7,000 Nigerians were studying in various American universities as foreign students.
Hawkins who said this when he visited Gov. Rauf Aregbesola of Osun also commended him for making education a priority.
We are in Osun to see and feel the culture and tourism of the state, as well as to understand the heritage, belief system and culture of the people of the South-West.
We appreciate the beautiful scenery and ambience of the Osun Grove, and we hope to repeat this (visit) yearly,” Hawkins said.
The Consul-General, who particularly lauded Aregbesola for his reforms in education, observed that with what was on ground in the state, the governor was a lover of education.
He said the governor had proved that education was a major sector in national and human development by re-structuring the sector in line with best practices in the world.
Hawkins, who said more than 7,000 Nigerian students were in different American universities, said the figure was the highest from the African continent.
This figure is higher than that of any country on the African continent. This shows how governments in this country take education very serious,” he added.
Responding, Aregbesola said his administration would continue to give education the priority it deserved, adding that he had learnt so much from the U.S. example.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Hawkins was in company of some U.S. Consulate officials during the visit to the state for its art and cultural attractions.
BUSINESS DAY 

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