Governor Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State is the current poster child of erring governors; governors who have not been able to pay workers\u2019 salaries for a long spell.\u00a0 In Aregbesola case, the man has not bothered to pay his State\u2019s workers or retirees\u2019 pension since sometime last year.\u00a0 The governor has received a lot of drubbing in the media for that singular crime so much so that he now wears a permanent, lop-sided smirk.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve always wondered why the governor was singled out for such trenchant beating when a few other governors also owe State workers salary.\u00a0 Well, it turned out that those beating up on the Ogbeni know him well.\u00a0 It\u2019s turned out that Aregbesola is an exemplar of what is generally wrong with the Blackman.<\/p>\n
Some days ago, I saw a loud report, accompanied by a YouTube video and about one million colourful photographs of the commissioning of the Nelson Mandela Freedom Park in Osogbo, Osun State.\u00a0 You see, there was always a park in Osogbo.\u00a0 For some odd reason, it was called Osogbo Freedom Park.\u00a0 When the great man, Mandela passed on in December 2013, the park was renamed after him by the State governor.\u00a0 All of that was appropriate and even commendable.<\/p>\n
What was not appropriate was when Aregbesola embarked on the second phase development of the park recently, poured a lot of money into its renovation and facelift and then commissioned the park on Thursday, 6 August 2015.\u00a0 This, while Osun State workers and pensioners are starving.<\/p>\n
It is the height of insensitivity, and misplaced priority \u2013 the bane of Black leaders everywhere.\u00a0 At best, the governor earned himself a public relation disaster; at worst, it was another exhibition of frightful incompetence.<\/p>\n
How can any parent prioritise the beautification of his home over and above his starving children?\u00a0 Even if (as I suspect) the money for the project has been earmarked from another time, is now the most auspicious time to be doing this?\u00a0 Then the governor proceeded to offload a proper owambe for his daughter\u2019s recent wedding rather than have a more sedate, small family affair.\u00a0 What message is this chap sending to people?<\/p>\n
In February 2013, it was this same governor who, perhaps out of boredom, bought a helicopter.\u00a0 His government officials claimed the helicopter cost N500 million, a figure no one believes.\u00a0 Aregbesola said the thing will be used for surveillance.\u00a0 But for more than two years, the chopper has not surveyed anything.\u00a0 Allah only knows to what use the chopper is being put.\u00a0 My guess will be occasional leasing and government official use.\u00a0 Because as at July 2015, the governor was still hoping that \u201ccentral government will issue us the sort code\u201d to enable him use the chopper for aerial surveillance.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s not all.<\/p>\n
Believe it or not, the governor also bought several Armoured Personnel Carriers.\u00a0 This is what Ogbeni had to say on that: \u201cDespite our ranking as one of the least state with crime in the country, much still needs be done to get rid of the little criminals still hanging around the state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the people you are purportedly protecting remain hungry and sick.\u00a0 This is the strange logic that propels most of Black leadership.\u00a0 And when they run out of ideas, they shove religion down the people\u2019s throat \u2013 a scam for which the governor is well known.<\/p>\n
Osun State depends almost entirely on Federal monthly handouts.\u00a0 I have been to the State once \u2013 September of last year in fact. \u00a0All I saw were posters of the governor everywhere.\u00a0 The only thing that looks slightly threatening in that State is something they call Dodo Ikire.\u00a0 It is the ugliest thing you\u2019ve ever seen in your life.\u00a0 It is supposed to be some kind of snack: tiny, greasy, charcoal black with specks of what looked like sesame or large pepper seeds; packaged in what I assume were used Pure Water sachets.<\/p>\n
Are these what Ogbeni wants to survey from the air?<\/p>\n
A lot of good Osun people are just too relieved to have a governor who didn\u2019t openly steal an election and pilfer everything in sight like the previous occupant of that office did that they readily give Aregbesola a pass.\u00a0 But evidently something is not right.\u00a0 And when a few brave voices rightly express their concerns, the governor\u2019s cortege of \u2018yes men\u2019 rise up from their various crypts and shout them down.\u00a0 Where shame, embarrassment and contrition ought to be shown, haughtiness and callous arrogance is instead on display.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, Osun State government house has become a Mecca of sorts for all manner of felicitating groups and associations.\u00a0 Every other day, the governor is visited by a delegation of The Licensed Carpenters of Gbogan, The Suya Seasoners of Nigeria, or some other obscure well-wisher.\u00a0 Haba!\u00a0 What are they all looking for there?<\/p>\n
Instead of food, Aregbesola has given his people a first-class freedom park.\u00a0 Whenever they\u2019re hungry or cannot afford to pay kids school fees, they can at least head to the park, sit down and have a good think about things.\u00a0 Perhaps bumble bees and bird droppings would give them a different perspective on life…<\/p>\n
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