AJIMOBI WAS IMPOSED ON OYO -AYOADE, NDP SCRIBE

Prince Ademola Ayoade is the National Financial Secretary of the National Democratic Party (NDP). He was governorship candidate of the party in Oyo State for the last elections. Ayoade, who spoke with GBENGA ADESUYI believes that Governor Abiola Ajimobi was imposed on the people by the Ibadan elite and that they would soon regret their action, among other national issues. Excerpts:

2011 elections
One thing we must do is to change our understanding of democracy and our system of governmenance must be changed if we must get there. The democracy we are practising in the country is too expensive and it would be very difficult for us to get anything out of it. I am suggesting that we go back to parliamentary system which would be very easy for us to develop. The cost of conducting an election is very expensive. People put a lot of things into contesting for an election and if they win, they make sure they get back all their investment.

You can imagine how much we spend on our legislators, from the state lawmakers up to the federal level and other political appointees. You can also imagine a minister having as many as six special assistants, a member of House of Representatives having as many as eight or more, some of them even appoint their wives and children.

Emergence of Ajimobi as Oyo State Governor
With the role played by Ibadan people during the last elections in Oyo State, I foresee a situation where they (Ibadan) would regret their actions. What they are telling us is that whatever they want will happen in the state, they have forgotten that we have Ibarapa, Oyo, Oke-Ogun and Ogbomoso also in the state. They often claim that out of the 33 local governments councils in the state, Ibadan has 11, that the population of Ibadan is more than any other town.

They have failed to realise that in Ibadan, there are people from Ibarapa, Ogbomoso, Igbirra, Itsekiri, Ijebu, Ekiti, Ijesha, Hausa and Igbo, and they form part of the population they are claiming. Whether they like it or not, the truth is that Ibadan natives are only 30 per cent of the entire population of Ibadan, the remaining 70 per cent are non-natives. They want to lord over us, the moment they don't like somebody, they would insist they don't want such a person. Forget their problem with Akala, they did it during the time of Bola Ige. That was why they put Dr. Omololu Olunloyo there as governor. Sooner than later they will realise they made a mistake by imposing Ajimobi on the people of the state. Definitely, Ajimobi was imposed on the people because he has a lot of godfathers both within and outside the state.

For Ajimobi, he was not prepared for the challenges of governance. He has not spent up to 100 days in office and he is already failing the people. The man has not shown that he is capable of ruling the state. It was the Ibadan people that put us in this mess. I expect him to have done his homework well. He is no doubt a very intelligent man. During that election, among all the three leading contestants in that election, we know that Akala and Ladoja have been tested, but for Ajimobi, we only heard of him when he was senator. I never saw any of his impact in my area, (Ibarapa).

As the governor now, he's not doing well. I once aspired to be the governor of the state and I had programmes to be executed within my 100 days in office. Employing people to sweep in the highway like they are doing in Osun State to me is not provision of job at all. Will you ask a graduate of engineering, economics or microbiology to be cleaning the streets? Many of the people at the helms of affairs in this country are liars. Our politicians are not sincere.

Minimum wage
President Goodluck Jonathan signed into law new minimum wage but he forgot when he was signing that it might be difficult for him to implement it. He signed it into law before the election and most of the governors turned it into campaign issue. If they are prepared to rule, they would have done their calculations, and understand the workings of government, before promising to pay the new minimum wage. They are not interested in the welfare of the people.

Al-Mustapha
Nigeria is a country where people are not given value. Al-Mustapha is an intelligent officer. If it is in another country, Al-Mustapha would have been kept where he would be training people on espionage and security. If somebody like him can be the Chief Security Officer (CSO) to a man that was hated by almost everybody in the country and even in the Western world and it was unable to pull him (Abacha) down until a gang up of poison came up. The fact that Abiola died a month after Abacha leaves no one in doubt that something happened beyond our understanding and this man knew so many things by virtue of his position that we don't know. I believe he should be kept somewhere so that the country can tap from his intelligence.

IBB
Members of our party, National Democratic Party (NDP) still believe in General Ibrahim Babangida, he is or friend, we respect his political sagacity. We also believe that he would still be president of the country. The time, we cannot say, age or no age, IBB would be President of the country once again. What was the age of Obasanjo when he became the President in 1999 and 2003?