A leading governorship aspirant in the People’s Democratic Party in Ondo State and the Secretary General of the Pan Yoruba Socio-Political Group, Afenifere Chief Olusola Ebiseni, has said that this year’s election is going to be a defining moment for the state.
Ebiseni, a lawyer and former commissioner in the state, said that the people of the state know their true leaders.
According to him, “If you follow the trajectory of governance from the Ajasin era, our state has had the rare privilege of being governed by governors who are not only intellectually suave, grounded in their chosen carriers, thoroughly-bred, and groomed in the ideology of the Awolowo school of thought, which defines our Welfarist programmes with which our people and politics have been identified.
“Besides, Ondo State is very proud, and having produced Ajasin, Adefarati, Agagu, Mimiko and Akeredolu who were and are men who gave our state a delightful corporate image, the comity of governors must always strive, like one of the leaders of the party told me when I visited him on consultations, to maintain such standards. The development of our state also requires being fully acquainted with the territory and the people.
“Such knowledge affords the new manager the opportunity to determine the location of resources, create wealth therefrom, and fairly allocate the same without undue concentration in one or a few places.
“From serving as an elected Local Government Chairman to being Commissioner three times in the strategic Ministry of Environment and Mineral Resources, we have a comparative advantage in the knowledge of the state and the geopolitical distribution of its natural resources. These include oil and gas, forestry resources, economic crops, and solid minerals.
“Diversification of the economy of the state from over-reliance on the federation account is the only means of getting out of the woods and must be prioritised. There is a creative way of developing our resources within the provisions of the Constitution.
“Certain social services that set our state apart ideologically and that have been discontinued or totally abandoned must be resuscitated in terms of quality and affordable education and health services, including the Mother and Child hospitals, which will be fairly extended in the zones, and many of such welfare programmes.
“It is a cheap petit-bourgeois mind-set to argue that the state cannot afford such existential programmes. I was privileged to be part of the team that accomplished this for the state.
Ebiseni who was a delegate at the 2014 National Conference said that “as the Secretary General of Afenifere, we shall join forces with progressive forces for restructuring the Federation for true federalism.
