The governorship candidate of All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ogun State, Dapo Abiodun has said that if elected, he would run a government with focus on the masses and rural communities in the state.
Abiodun, Chief Executive Officer of Heyden Petroleum Limited and First Independent Power Limited, promised to bring the state’s internally generated revenue (IGR) close to what Lagos State is currently generating.
He said that he would run a government that would focus on the masses of the state and not on the elite.
An eight-man electoral panel set up by the National Working Committee (NWC) had penultimate Wednesday declared Abiodun winner having polled 102,305 votes to defeat five other aspirants in a governorship primary election conducted in the state’s 236 wards and 20 Local Government Areas (LGAs).
Muhammad Indabawa, who chaired the electoral panel, noted that the five governorship aspirants namely; Jimi Lawal polled 51, 153 votes; Abimbola Ashiru polled 29, 764; Sen. Gbenga Kaka 17,771; Abayomi Hunye 9,110 and Hon. Adekunle Akinlade 23, 443.
Abiodun’s declaration did not go down well with the camp of the governor which held its parallel congress earlier on Tuesday and declared Hon Adekunle Akinlade, the incumbent lawmaker representing Yewa South/Ipokia Federal Constituency, as its standard bearer.
The Chairman of Ogun State APC, Chief Derin Adebiyi claimed that Akinlade polled 190,987 votes to defeat five other governorship aspirants, though the NWC rejected the outcome of the parallel primary election.
But speaking on his governance blueprint, Abiodun pledged to focus on pro-people programmes, which according to him, would be geared towards ameliorating the living conditions of the people of the state.
Unlike the Amosun administration, Abiodun said he would bring the state government closer to the masses of the state if elected Governor of Ogun State in February 2019, assuring that he would a mass-centre government.
“I will be more inclined to execute projects that will directly affect the masses than projects that will focus on the elites. I will focus on how to improve on rural areas because our people are traders and farmers.
“I will equally develop rural areas across the state so that they can help facilitate bringing of goods or agricultural produce to cities and towns. I will ensure that the people can conveniently come from their various hinterlands into the towns, so that they can trade their goods,” he explained.
He, also, promised to create jobs for the indigenes of Ogun State, noting that he “will look at the other sectors of the economy apart from agriculture to create jobs. I will invest a lot of time in ensuring that each senatorial district is self-sufficient because Ogun State enjoys proximity to Lagos.”
Specifically, the governorship candidate observed that there was no reason the Internal Generated Revenue (IGR) of Ogun State “should not be at par with that of Lagos State. Every functional company in Nigeria berth in Ogun State.