By Adeyele Ogunbanwo

Preamble
As Ogun State inches closer to the 2019 elections, there are intense and far-reaching moves by aspirants to collar the various tickets to represent the many parties vying for political posts and ruling power. In each party and for each post, there are often over ten aspirants jostling to become their party’s flag bearers. A chance encounter with a few of the aspirants alerted this guest contributor to Ogun Revivalist to the need to evaluate the activities and personalities of the gladiators battling to represent the people from 2019 onward.

Interestingly, many of the aspirants are averse to having lights shed on their activities either as current political office holders, serving political appointees or career figures in governmental agencies. Some are quick to deflect questions as to their suitability for the post they are vying for or dodge investigation into details of their stewardship. However, Adeyele Ogunbanwo has examined each position up for grabs in the various parties and focuses on the most viable aspirant of all. In this particular write up, he starts with the ruling party APC and the House of Representatives seat for the Ijebu Central Federal Constituency.

Belling the Cat
The first time I picked an interest in examining the various aspirants was when I was invited to a party of the APC chairman for Odogbolu local government, Chief Odunlami. According to the party faithful who invited me, that would give me the chance to evaluate firsthand the people running for political offices and their disposition towards members of the public. Therefore to the party, I went. Unfortunately, there were only two aspirants there –a certain Professor Oyefeso and Otunba Badejo. The summation of that encounter was that while Badejo was warm and friendly, Oyefeso was withdrawn and distant. Well, that was not a sin, right? However, it did get me to want to get to know the aspirants better. As a result, I accepted all invitations –and there were many- to rallies, visit to local governments, visits to special gatherings, parties, and visits towards –well, it seems only Otunba Abayomi Badejo visited the wards so far.

Badejo is simple and warm and freely associates with everyone, including those aspiring to the same political post.
At each venue and event, I mixed with the masses and weighed what they had to say against the activities of the aspirants and came up with the summation that Otunba Badejo trumped them all. How so? Let’s do a wade-in-the-pool without swimming i.e. without naming names.

Not honoured or Loved at Home
One of the major candidates, actually an incumbent is seen as a prodigal. Having spent eight years representing the constituency, it is difficult for anyone, even in the aspirant’s own local government to point to a single benefit resulting from giving him the mandate. As one elderly woman said, ‘We used to call him on the phone before he won the election but since he did, his number no longer went through.’ Another lamented, ‘’Eight years we have not seen anything. We are not asking for ourselves but for our children. If our children have jobs, they will be able to give us something to maintain ourselves. But there is nothing –no development, no investment, no progress, nothing.

I was working on ways to obtain a response from the aspirant’s when I read an interview granted by the aspirant to the Punch newspapers last month. In it, the aspirant gave reasons for his failure to do anything for his constituency in the eight years he has spent representing it. He argued that he had spent those eight years gaining the experience he would use to serve his people well thus he intended to go for four more years. After twelve years, he would have garnered enough knowledge in the House of Representatives to be able to work for the good of his people. That reminds me of the Yoruba proverb, ‘Tí Lágbájá bá fi oguń ọduń pilẹ̀ wèrè, ọduń wo ló tó fẹ́ já síta?’ If someone must spend twelve years learning how to function as a lawmaker, when will he really start serving the people? After twenty-four years?



Many of the women want what is best for their children but have met with deafening silence from the serving House of Representatives member in Ijebu Central Federal Constituency

My take is that this aspirant/serving representative missed the mark. He has failed woefully in keeping his solemn promise to the people and in a saner clime, should be ashamed to go before them to ask for a third mandate. But the belief in the power of money to buy the people’s mandate gives people like this a false sense of security. They also trust in the powers that be to give them the position despite the people’s protestations as has been the case in the past. I think though that this aspirant and others like him are setting themselves up for a shocker. The people are becoming wiser and more resistant while the powers that be are beginning to shed off useless feathers (non-performing protégés).



The Plagiarist

An aspirant I closely monitored falls into this category. While plagiarism is something many people engage in, often unknowingly or because they do not know the implication of such an action, it is often painful to see people aspiring to be examples to the populace steal other people’s ideas without giving those people credits. The aspirant steals from Awo, Zik, and other notable political philosophers yet fails to give credits to any of them. Is this an isolated case which one can slap away with the back of the hand? No! Not when the same person claims to be a member of the association he does not belong to just to gain political leverage.

Now, this brings us to the question of what the aspirant has done for his community or the association he claims to be a part of –nothing. The current spending spree is a result of the self-centred quest to get political power and enjoy the trappings of high office. Where has he been for so many years and what has been his impact on his people, even at his local government? Possibly he has done things in the past that we are not aware of which are not linked to his political ambition and we will be unhesitant in tendering an apology while lauding such achievements.

On this note, I will suggest that a debate is organised among the aspirants, along with the leaders sponsoring them, so that the electorate will have a feel of what the aspirants have been doing in the past and present as a way of gaining an insight into the future plans.



The man Who Was, Who Is and Will Always Stand with the People



When I first got the text message to join the Badejo’s visit to Ward 2 in Ijebu North East local government, I thought it was another political jamboree which was not worth my time. My first inclination was to decline but remembering what I saw at the APC LG chairman’s party, I decided to go. At the time of writing this, I can attest to the fact that in what is an uncommon and unprecedented act by current politicians aspiring to represent the Ijebu Central Federal Constituency, Hon. Otunba Badejo Adewale Abayomi is the only aspirant to have visited almost all APC wards in Ijebu North East, Odogbolu and Ijebu Ode local government areas. As he went from one ward to the other, he performed wonders by donating much-needed items and renovating ward secretariats in Ijebu Central Federal Constituency.

Without bias and after examining the activities of the various aspirants in the last three years, I can say that Honourable Badejo stands head above shoulders over the others. Below are some of the things Badejo has done: things others and I actually confirmed to be true. He has:

Renovated all local government party secretariats across Ijebu Central Federal Constituency
Donated four (4) fans and generators to all the local government party secretariats across Ijebu Central Federal Constituency.
Donated farm spraying tanks (knapsacks) to all wards in Ijebu Central Federal Constituency.
Renovated the party secretariat in Ward 1 Odogbolu local government with the sum of one hundred thousand naira (N100, 000.00).
Visited the new LCDA wards in Odogbolu local government and donated cash to them.
Donated fans to Ward 10 in Ijebu North East local government.
Donated chairs to Ward 9 party secretariat in Ijebu North East (the neglected ward of the incumbent House of Representatives member, Honourable Odeneye)
Donated 8 fans and 2 generators to wards in Aiyepe Ijebu, Odogbolu local government.
Donated bundles of zinc roofing sheets to Wards 13 and 14 in Odogbolu Local government towards renovations of their secretariats.
Donated 30 plastic chairs to Ward 10 in Odogbolu local government.
Paid the rent of the party secretariat for Ward 10 in Odogbolu local government.
Donated 4 fans and a generator to Ward 7, Odogbolu local government.
Donated bundles of zinc roofing sheets to leaders of Ward 12 affected by a thunderstorm.
Donated fans and a generator to Ward 5 in Odogbolu local government
Empowered a blind party leader in Ijebu North East by giving him a brand new grinding machine set (grinder and engine) and cash.
Donated one hundred thousand naira in cash (N100, 000.00) cash to the APC youth leadership of Odogbolu local government to buy a brand new engine for the bus donated by the government.
Sponsored a Leguru LCDA football competition to the tune of almost five hundred thousand naira (N500, 000.00).
Donated items and renovated Ward 10 party secretariat in Odogbolu local government
Empowered women who wanted to establish their own fish trade in Odogbolu local government in appreciation of their decamping to APC from other parties.
Rendered an invaluable assistance to a few women leaders who desperately needed help and had not been able to get any.

These things I witnessed Honourable Badejo do willingly, listening to the needs of the people and doing his best to satisfy them. At a ward, he bailed a youth leader out by donating fifty thousand naira (N50, 000.00) towards the burial of the latter’s mother. The youth leader had sat dejectedly at the back, lost in thoughts and disinterested in what was going on when someone took the microphone and spoke about the youth leader’s predicament. I followed up the promise in the evening and got confirmation that the youth leader had got an alert for the money.

The observation might be that Otunba Badejo like others was only doing this to gain political favour but that is not so. Everywhere you go in Ijebu Central Federal Constituency, people speak well of this man and reveal that he’d been doing good since 1996 leading to his being given the title of Òtuńba Àsálù (a shield/shelter/refuge/resort) of the Odogbolu Kingdom.

Compared to others, he gave because he knows what it means to grow up without the proverbial silver spoon, selling charcoal and kerosene on the streets of Shomolu in Lagos. As a wealthy man, he did not forget his people and rather than join the train of others who settle in Lagos or foreign countries, built his house in Odogbolu and comes home regularly to see to his people’s needs. Unlike him, others, including the two political appointees lack roots in Ogun state and have left Lagos or overseas to vie for their share of the national cake, at least the portion allocated to the Gateway State.

Political Appointees
Very little needs to be said about these ones. My evaluation discovers two who have been serving in the government but have not thought it wise to use their positions to work to the benefit of the people. While one thinks that it’s until he wins a political post before he can help his people, even in the line of mass media, the other thinks giving stipends (or N20) to each person in a ward every three months equates to empowering them. The questions all well-meaning individuals should ask these ones, including the third who is a professor are:

Where are they from, really?
Where have they been?
What have they done for the people while holding political appointments in Lagos, Ogun or other states?
Compared to Honourable Wole Diya (who though serves in Lagos yet has strong roots in Odogbolu and its environs). How many people have they used their connection to help?
It is interesting that the Women leader of one of the wards from which an aspirant launched his aspirations turned her away at her moment of need but could spend hundreds of thousands of naira settling hospitality bills before and after he was approached for help. Another flatly rejected an appeal for assistance from the Christian Association of Nigeria to execute a project that will benefit the people of his community. Many of these aspirants relate with their supporters in hotels and guest houses, and event centres thus making it easy to avoid these ones after being elected. An aspirant, in an interview conducted by Punch, could only point to the achievements of the Ogun State governor when asked how he had spent his four years as a political appointee and the benefits he had brought to his people.

Conclusion
In a clime where many write for money or for some forms of rewards, this writer and the write up may be dismissed as a mouthpiece of the one candidate positively projected. I will not battle or deride such opinions. What I will appeal for is that others, writers and readers alike, conduct a similar investigation into all the aspirants in their constituencies. Let us all come out with a verdict on all the aspirants vying to represent us across all the parties –PDP, APC, ADC, ADP, and so on. The benefit of this is that we can beat our chest later and claim that as writers, we helped to put the best man or woman in office in 2019. We can also lend our voice to calling for a debate among aspirants in each constituency so that we can all listen and pass a verdict on them. The fourth estate of the realm is called the gatekeeper. It’s time we start living up to our name.