If you are a bit familiar with Lagos, in your mind’s eye imagine From Maryland’s junction through the Mobolaji Bank Anthony to Ikeja Under Bridge with less than 20 cars on both sides of the road.
Apart from prime election mornings, I do not think that road can get such a traffic till the end of time. But this is a regular occurrence on most newly constructed roads in Osun State.
How it all began
An election tribunal which had lingered in courts made a declaration in 2010. This declaration ushered in the return of mandate to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in the 2007 gubernatorial elections in Osun State. The flag bearer Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola practically “hit the ground running”.
A court pronouncement tagged as the “Victory for the Electorates” was welcomed with wild jubilation across the state and a major boost for the Asiwaju’s party (ACN). I can remember following the Students Union Government delegates from Obafemi Awolowo University to Osogbo, as a reflection of our spirit of fighting every form of injustice to a standstill, to celebrate unique victory and reward for doggedness and tenacity.
And The Music Stopped…
It was a jolly romance until the first sign of trouble started after the re-election of the governor for his second term in 2014. I was at the time in Benue state, undergoing my compulsory One year youth service. A man obviously bent on infrastructural development in the State, I saw his re-election as a critical factor to lifting Osun state from the position of a laggard among the 5 other South Western states in Nigeria.
“Ogbeni” won his re-election bid and then the trouble started. Prior to this time, the governor has successfully combined his drive for infrastructural development across the state with the crucial recurrent expenditure obligations of the state. As a typical civil servants state, the public sector has been the major employer of labour in the state. This has made the public workers crucial factors in politics in the state (Talking of how Chief Bisi Akande lost his re-election bid in 2003, a story for another time).
The global drop in crude oil price, the existing debt service obligations from previous loans used in financing major projects prior to the second term elections in conjunction to the deepening crisis between the state government and the government at the center (federal government) controlled by the “opposition party” led to a plunge in the monthly allowance to the state.
What was combined effortlessly become significantly hard for the state government. The government began experimenting with various fractional salaries payment templates, from 30% to 50% to 70% and back to 30%, only one thing was sure - the workers stopped getting full salary payments from their monthly turmoil.
Like a curious case of the Falcon unable to hear the Falconer, what began like a love romance was fast degenerating into an head on collision between the people and the elected governor.
I will continue this narrative tomorrow;
- How the “new” road projects become under-utilised;
- The Dangers in shop-lifting development models; and
- Looking at the brighter side of it all.