Local Governments in Oyo state have gone comatose under the suffocating grips of Governor Seyi Makinde.
The selected errand boys impersonating as “local Government Chairmen* are mitigated failures and they can’t help it.
He who pays the piper will surely dictate his choice tunes.
Governor Makinde in 2021 employed every means possible, including illegal dissolution of validly elected Chairmen, disobedience of court orders and violence to put them in the local Governments as Chairmen.
The people of Ibarapa East and Ido Local Governments will not forget in a hurry, the violence visited on them by Governor Makinde in 2021.
I listened to Sheriff Adeojo, the Chairman of Ido Local Government and PDP candidate for the forthcoming local Government Election on a local Radio station yesterday.
The guy have been at the helms of affairs in Ido Local Government for almost five years now.
He was first appointed a Caretaker chairman before his selection as “elected” chairman about three years ago.
Sheriff further confirmed what we all have known and that is the fact that the Local Governments in Oyo state are just an appendage of the Governor.
When he was asked to list his achievements across the ten wards of Ido Local Government, the guy went on a voyage of how he had to gift out cash to communities that requested intervention for projects as elementary as repair of culverts, bridges, purchase and purchase of transformers just because, according to him, the Local Government was handicapped financially to shoulder the responsibilities of doing those projects as at the times the requests were tabled!
That a serious eye opener and a terrible indictment, most especially, considering the fact that the chairman never pointed to a reasonable project done by him beyond sinking of a few boreholes, erection of a scanty streetlights and grading of roads.
The chairman made a tame claim at the tarred road from Omi to Ido.
He was clever not to amplify on the only project he could have laid claim to and why is that?
Even though, the funds with which the road was constructed might have been taken out of the Allocations meant for Ido Local Government but the senior prefect have taken over the show and the chairman knows his place, not to outshine the master.
The same road project was flagged off with an elaborate ceremony by the Governor shortly before the last general election.
In the eyes of the public and as the Governor have posited, the credit for the project goes to the Governor and to him alone.
Ask Sheriff Adeojo to show you the documents and details of the contract for the project and I bet he won’t dare.
Though, the funds with which the project was done might be that of Ido Local Government, that is the limit of his knowledge.
The Governor, I am sure, supplied the contractor and negotiated the contract.
This facts are further attestable when the chairman, in answer to the calls for rehabilitation of the Wire and Cable road and others, said the Governor ” have sent people to measure the roads”.
Sheriff Adeojo further confirmed the insinuations out there that the local Government Chairmen in Oyo state have been in total captivity of the Governor.
Governor Makinde himself also did not hide this facts when he said during a Radio interview that he does supervise the Chairmen.
One only wonders from where he got the authority to supervise elected Chairmen as if the latter are a bunch of kids.
The rehabilitation of the Akesan Market is another instance.
The chairman of Atiba local Government always have a huge task each time he had to explain the ineptitudes tag put on him by the Governor.
The project was handled by the Governor, even though, the funds expended were those of the local Governments in Oyo town.
According to section 7 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as amended, local Governments are free from any other Authority, that of state inclusive.
Unfortunately, Governor Makinde have combined the Administration of local Governments with that of the state here in Oyo state.
That is not only unacceptable, it is also illegal.
No matter how good the intention is, the Law forbids a situation where the Governor will suprintend over the Administration and finances of the local Governments.
At any rate, I can confidently say that there is nothing good about the intent of the Governor in annexing the local Governments.
The action is aimed only at achieving personal benefits for the Governor to the detriment of Oyo state.
The Governor have just been exploiting the Councils, diverting Its funds for personal benefits through projects like the Light up Oyo state and other projects.
The forthcoming local Government Election have provided a fresh opportunity for the people of Oyo state to stop this illegality and recklessness.
It is almost certain that the Governor have been using the Councils’ funds to engage in a futile fight against the sacked Local Government Chairmen.
This recklessness must be stopped.
The monies generated through the PMS are naturally IGR by the Local Governments but we all heard how the former Chairman of the PMS, Auxillary, in an interview recently claimed that he used such monies to support Governor Makinde’s second term ambition!
Monies meant to develop our Local Governments, expended on the political ambition of one man and illegally so.
The only option open to the people of Oyo state is to see the opportunity of the forthcoming local Government Election as an avenue and the only one legally available to stop the mindless mismanagement of the local Governments in Oyo state.
This could only be done if the candidates of the PDP are rejected in the polls.
Good enough, the main opposition political party, the APC is participating in the election.
That should be a credible alternative to curb the excesses of the Governor.
That is the only way to revive our local Governments that are already in the Intensive Care Unit, courtesy of the constant abuse by Governor Makinde.
SOLA ABEGUNDE.
