Oyetola Tells All He Has Done In 3 years As Osun Gov

The Governor of Osun State Gboyega Oyetola is celebrating his third year in office.

And he insists he has kept faith his electoral promises.

To show how well he has done, the 67year details his achievement in a post that starts with “My Dear Good People of Osun” and reads…

It is with immense gratitude to the Almighty God that I address you on this historic occasion of the third-year anniversary of our Administration.

I vividly recall how the journey started three years ago; how by your belief in me and your conviction in the plans and programmes of our Party, you exercised your right to vote for me.

With that singular act, you chose an assured future anchored on a genuine quest for an Osun that works, a prosperous Osun that is driven by an untainted vision, ethical fortitude, and well-thought-out developmental roadmap.

Motivated by God’s promise, my conviction and your avowed promise, I promised that I would serve you with steady heart and hands. I promised that I would hit the ground running once I assumed office. I gave my word that I would put you first and run a people-centred government. I pledged to uphold the best ideals befitting of an Omoluabi.

I promised to manage state resources judiciously and run an administration that is transparent, accountable and incorruptible. I promised to run an administration that is truly inclusive, participatory and harnesses our diverse gifting and potential for the common good. I promised to run an economy that is fully revitalised and to leverage on our unique endowments to stimulate wealth-creation and sustainable development.

It is now three years and by the Grace of God, we have neither reneged on God’s promise nor disappointed you. We have kept faith with you. We have maintained fidelity with our electoral promises.

We have worked hard and kept doing so in our determined quest to bring to fruition the Osun of our dream and our shared vision.
Each day of the past three years has been defined by painstaking commitment to serving you selflessly and efficiently.

Our administration is founded on the power of your participation. From the Thank You tour we undertook across our State on assumption of office to the DFID-supported Citizens’ Needs Assessment, from the various budgetary consultations to Apero and Civic Engagement – our grassroots engagement platform, we have valued you all the way. Your yearnings have constantly reflected in the execution of our Development Agenda.

In delivering this initiative, we have built institutions and placed the state on the path of sustainable development. We have instituted creative and innovative financial and good governance initiatives to keep our economy afloat and embark on projects in the face of prevailing national economic downturn. We engaged in transparent governance mechanisms – plugging wastes and blocking loopholes.

This has enabled us to pay salaries and pensions, and to take care of other welfare issues, among others. We have instituted inclusive governance and placed the people at the centre of all that we do.

We have continued the transformation of Osun from where we inherited it three years ago.

We have revitalised some General Hospitals and over 300 of the 332 Primary Health Centres have been completed and are being used across the State. The remaining ones are at various stages of completion and will be commissioned very soon. The construction of the 120-bed ward at the State Specialist Hospital, Asubiaro, is nearing completion, while that of the 30 units of Doctor’s Quarters has been completed and will soon be inaugurated.

We have also instituted the Osun Health Insurance Scheme (OHIS) to deliver affordable healthcare to our workers while offering free health services to the vulnerable under the scheme.

In furtherance of our administration’s agenda geared towards the transformation of the health sector of the State for improved service delivery at the care facilities level, we have approved a comprehensive rehabilitation and renovation of the dilapidated buildings of the Comprehensive Health Centre, Apomu, in Isokan Local Government Area, as well as the Comprehensive Health Centre, Fadilulah, in Osogbo Local Government Area of the State.

We are rehabilitating roads across the Nine Federal Constituencies to improve on road network, open up the rural areas and ease movement of our people and their produce to ensure rapid socio-economic development. We have sustained the construction of the major road projects that we inherited from our predecessor. We will continue to fund the dualisation of Gbongan-Akoda Dual Carriage Way, as well as Old Garage (Osogbo)-Ikirun-Ila-Odo-Erinle, which, together, are Federal Roads spanning a total length of 66.8 km.
We have also rehabilitated and constructed many other roads across the State. Among these roads are: Ada-Igbajo road, Osogbo-Kelebe-Iragbiji road, and Akindeko-Awosuru link road via Adejumo Street with Oremeji spur, Akinlade Street, Adewale Street with loop to WAEC road all in Osogbo; Army Barack (Ede)-Ara-Ejigbo township road, Moro-Yakoyo-Ipetumodu-Asipa-Ife/Ibadan Expressway Junction Road and Ereja Roundabout-Ereguru-Isaare-Oke Oye-Sabo (Irojo)-Ilesa/Akure Expressway Junction, Iloro/Aganun/Abiri road, Itaasin (St. Stephen Church)-Our Lady School-Police Divisional Headquarters, Famia Road, Nike Gallery-Ido-Osun Township airport with palace spur, Ikirun-Eko-Ende Road and Gbogan Township Road to mention but a few among several others. We shall soon complete Eko-Ende Road.

The Olaiya Flyover, which was flagged off in February to ease the growing traffic around the axis, reduce cases of accidents and make the lives of our valued citizens more secure, has reached over 85 percent completion and will be commissioned anytime from now.
To further enhance easy flow of human traffic, goods and services, and to deliver socioeconomic development, government has commenced the rehabilitation of several roads, including Lawyer Atanda Road, Iwo, Ila-Arandun-Kwara Boundary Road, as well as the construction of access road to Fountain University, Osogbo. While some are still on-going, some are nearing completion.
We have also concluded arrangement to begin work on the construction/rehabilitation of roads in the following areas:

1. Iree
2. Inisa
3. Ife
4. Ijesa Land
5. Osogbo
6. Olorunda
7. Irepodun
8. Orolu
9. Oba Ile and Oba Oke
10. Ikire
    Our quest for rapid infrastructural development has indeed enjoyed significant fillip through the creative adoption of the Alternative Project Funding model to execute projects. Efforts will continue on the rehabilitation of Osogbo-Iwo Road with a view to reconstructing it fully. We shall also be rehabilitating Oyan-Otan Road, soon. As soon as we have access to more funds, other roads will also be considered.
    We are also leveraging purposeful partnerships to provide key infrastructural needs. We are also collaborating with the Federal Government to ensure the completion of the Osun airport.

Thankfully, our collaborative efforts, through our Ministry of Works and Transport and the Nigerian Airforce, is yielding positive results towards developing the Ido-Osun Airport Corridor.

Work has already commenced for the setting up of Airforce Base in our dear State. Among other things, this Base will house a Research Centre, Airforce Barracks and a Hanger.

The Nigerian Air Force is also establishing the School of Basic and Remedial Studies in our State through its Airforce Institute of Technology.

We are indeed grateful to the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, and the Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Isiaka Oladayo Amao, for this kindness.

We are also rehabilitating our schools and providing modern facilities across the State, while also putting in place mechanisms for ensuring discipline and enhancing school attendance to deliver quality, affordable and functional education, and to join the nation’s efforts to meet the Sustainable Development Goals.

Also, we are transforming the agriculture sector by providing an enabling environment that will make Osun the food hub of the South West.The State has established Demonstration Farms in collaboration with private investors to create Agricultural Hubs across the State.
To increase tomato production in the State, Green Houses have been established in our Demonstration Farms. Also, 23 hectares of farmland have been cleared at Ifon, in Orolu Local Government, as a Demonstration Site for youths and women empowerment and agro-processing centres. A Milk Collection Centre has also been established in collaboration with FrieslandCampina WAMCO.

To support the Cassava value chain and ensure food security in Osun, we have distributed high- quality cassava stems to our farmers.
As you are all aware, our Administration is working hard to ensure security of life and property. We shall stop at nothing to retain our profile as the safest and best secured State in the country. We crave your cooperation in this regard.

We thank the Osun Security Chiefs, our traditional rulers and all stakeholders for collaborating with us to effectively secure our State.
We remain committed to the welfare of our people. We thank all our workers for displaying understanding during the period of uncertainties. We shall not relent in our efforts to make our people happy.

During my inauguration, I promised to ensure that workers’ salaries are promptly paid. I also promised to resolutely defend and prioritise the welfare of workers and pensioners. I have not wavered on any of these despite the biting economic challenges in our nation. Not even when the global health emergency, COVID-19, came fully armed to upset our operational models and disrupt our economy.

It is in testament to our resilience that our State is one of the few across the country that have implemented the minimum wage. As a responsible and responsive government, it is our belief that workers should be able to get whatever is due to them.

Similarly, we have prioritised the payment of pensions. Despite our dire economic condition, we have so far spent about Forty Billion Naira on pensions and gratuities, including clearing the backlog of the arrears we inherited at the State and Local Government levels in the last three years. We believe that our pensioners deserve to receive their dues after labouring so hard to build our State. We shall continue to release funds regularly to take care of the current pensions and gratuities and to clear the backlog which we inherited. This is my pact with our senior citizens.

We are also not relenting in our social intervention programmes designed to bring the vulnerable and the needy into our welfare net. The Osun Food Support Scheme, which we flagged off in April this year, aimed at supporting 30, 000 vulnerable persons in our State on a monthly basis, is very much on course.

By next month, we shall be rolling out other support programmes for the elderly and widows in our dear State.

Our youths are our strength and the face of our sustainable development plan. Conscious of this reality, we constantly engage, cultivate and empower them to collectively find solutions to extant challenges.

So far, about 18,000 Osun youths have been empowered through various schemes, including loan disbursement to enable them to start new businesses and boost existing ones.

Very soon, we shall be recruiting another batch of O’YES Cadets as part of our youth empowerment scheme. We are also heavily integrating them in politics and governance as part of efforts to achieve the sustainable development.

During the first year of our Administration, we convened the Osun Economic Summit and established the Osun Investment Promotion Agency to launch a season of economic revolution in the State. Despite the adverse effect of Covid-19, the economic and investment efforts have yielded dividends. These are the Polythene Pipe and Tractor Assemblage Factory located at Free Trade Zone; Topsell Nigeria Limited, makers of perm kernel oil, located at Aisu, Ede; the International Trade Centre/Industrial Hub and Inland Port at Dagbolu, where some factories are already springing up. Other investment efforts are at various stages of MoU completion and their flag-off will be executed very soon.

We are working hard to exploit our critical sectors such as Agriculture, Tourism and Mining to rescue our economy from overdependence on Federal Allocation and turn our State into the economic hub of the South-West.

Osun is blessed with enormous potential buried in its soil. We have commenced efforts to exploit these resources and translate them to wealth. Our State occupies a unique place in the mining sector in Nigeria, and this underscores our sustained focus to create a proper framework for deriving maximum economic benefits from the solid minerals hosted by the State. The State has 17 mining licenses from the Nigerian Mining Corporation for its solid minerals. But until we came in three years ago, not much was done to improve the value of those licenses.

In June last year, we developed the Osun Solid Mineral Development Programme, which is responsible for implementing and overseeing the State’s policy for the mining sector.

So far, the programme has achieved some encouraging milestones in some of intervention areas – including the Osun/Omoluabi Mining Business Restructuring Scheme (OMBRS), which seeks to commercialise the State-owned mining company; and the Osun Revenue Diversification and Maximisation Scheme (ORDMS), designed to register all miners, mines and mining equipment, and report on all mining activities in the State in partnership with private sector partners.

Our efforts are already yielding significant results. This puts the mining sector of Osun in a good stead in terms of the positive economic derivatives and the creation of more jobs as a result of improved gold mining.

Today, Osun is host to Nigeria’s only large-scale commercial gold mine, facilitated by a Canadian-listed gold developer, Thor Explorations and its local subsidiary, Segilola Resources Operating Limited. The Segilola Gold Mine, which is expected to start producing Gold soon, is sited at Odo-Ijesha and Iperindo. The venture is a pioneering project in the Nigerian mining sector.

Our Administration is committed to values of probity, transparency and accountability. It was this commitment that earned us participation in World Bank programme tagged State Fiscal Transparency and Accountability Programme.

Hence, since assumption of office, we have put in place a most prudent financial model that has significantly reduced wastes and cut leakages. Using the Bank Accounts Monitoring System for the monitoring of day-to-day transactions, we have enshrined openness as a key principle of our Administration.

As trustees of State resources, we will continue to raise the bar in probity and accountability.

Fellow citizens, the journey of the past three years has been inspirational because of your unflinching support. As a State, we have collectively dared the impossible because you chose to believe in our vision.

Despite our diverse challenges, we have together made a significant difference. We shall not rest until we fully unleash our best potential possible. We need now, more than ever, to work together to sustain the commitment to our sustainable development vision and carry on strong.

I thank you for listening.