Opinion

Of altruism and sundry misconceptions

Published

3 years ago

May 7, 2022

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By Tunde Olusunle

Perhaps the most important news item out of Kaduna, Monday April 25, 2022, was the visit of Nyesom Wike, governor of Rivers State and and his solidarity with victims of banditry and violence in the state. In the course of that stopover in the north western state, Wike announced the donation of N200 million, to assuage the pains and dislocations suffered by victims of serial assaults on the state, by criminals and insurgents. The donation was consistent with Wike’s serial generosity, which has seen him support brother states across the country in times of need.

Wike, however, equally used the opportunity to engage with stakeholders of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, (PDP), in the state. He interacted with delegates of his party to solicit their votes during the May 29, 2022, which should produce the flagbearer for his party. Since the declaration of his intention to contest the nation’s top seat over a month ago, Wike has been on a restless tour of the country on the same mission. Ahmed Mohammed Makarfi, one of the founding members of the PDP and first governor of Kaduna State this fourth republic, led party leaders and delegates of the party in the state, to receive Wike.

Makarfi who had served in the national parliament as Senator after his stint in *Usman Katsina House,* Government House, Kaduna, had also led the PDP as National Chairman, during what was perhaps its most trying times, to date. The party was engulfed in a fiesty, make or mar leadership crisis, with two dignitaries laying claims to its national chairmanship. Ali Modu Sherrif, a former governor of Borno State, and his erstwhile counterpart, Makarfi, were in the trenches on opposite sides of the contestation. The brouhaha subsisted for two long years, between 2015 and 2017. Those times were truly challenging for a party which having been in power for 16 years, suddenly found itself an outsider without leadership or succour.

The situation snowballed into a protracted legal conundrum with conflicting judgments and injunctions issuing forth from different court rooms, across the country. Makarfi recalled with nostalgia: “When the Court of Appeal judgement came out against us and we knew we were right, everybody started running away.” Makarfi continued: “Wike called me and asked me: Are you ready for this fight?” I answered in the affirmative. Wike reassured me: “We are going to reclaim our party. What do you need? How do we go about it? And the rest is history.” Makarfi was not done: “Many people contributed to the PDP in many ways. But there is no single individual who contributed as much as he (Wike) did for us, to have the PDP which has survived till today.”

Left for the former chief executive of Kaduna State, he would gladly install Wike as president of the country if he had the powers. According to him: “If the presidency were an appointment and I have the powers to appoint people into the office, I will simply appoint you (Wike) and tell you to go home and rest.” Pursuing his thesis further, Makarfi said: “We are in a democracy, we have a major convention ahead and the delegates know those that have been with them and will continue to be with them. The party people know their own people… You are not sitting back at home banking on the favours you have done the party. Day and night, you are working, you are moving around. That shows commitment, the real desire to continue to serve.”

Those familiar with the trajectory of Wike over the years, acknowledge for a fact, his DNA for robust generosity. This, indeed, stands in sharp contrast with his fame as a “hard man.” Listening to, or observing Wike from afar especially his trademark no-nonsense mien, his characteristic bluntness, his scarce, maybe scant loosening up in laughter, one is inclined to profile him a difficult person. On deep interrogation, however, it would seem that Wike has elected to sustain this public profile, as a defence mechanism of sorts. The reality is that Wike is holistically African at heart. He cares not only about self, but about others and their wellbeing. Within the African context, he doesn’t just make enough broth for the consumption of his immediate family. He is conscious there could be wayfarers, worn and famished, who would knock on the door of his house, and can make do with a few morsels to placate their hunger.

Wike therefore, is a deeply conscientious giver. Not for him the razzle-dazzle and razzmatazz of public adulation for the blitzkrieg of it. Not at all. He shares with others to impact and imprint on their situations. Consistent with the old saying which exhorts that charity begins at home, Wike in May 2020, reached out to victims of the conflagration of March 2019, thrown up by the gubernatorial election which returned him to office, in Rivers State. Wike appropriately earned popularity with his people on the strength of his performance during his first term in office. The desperate opposition in the state, however, reportedly, visited mayhem on the hapless electorate, all in a bid to stall Wike’s reelection.

Specific local government areas where violence erupted include: Akuku-Toru, Asari-Toru, Abonema, Degema, Bonny, Ahoada West, Andoni, Ikwerre, Emouha and Okrika. Lives were lost, limbs dismembered at the polls. State security personnel openly took sides with candidates of the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress, (APC), despite public rejection of the party at all levels. While monetary support could not equate the souls smothered by the incidents, Wike made available the sum of N450 million, to survivors of the mayhem and families of the deceased, respectively.

That was not the first time or only occasion, Wike demonstrated empathy and fellow-feeling. Earlier in January 2018 during his first term as governor, Wike provided N50 million for the upkeep and education of a precocious one-year old baby girl, Purity Anthony. Her parents were murdered by a notorious brigand, Don Waney, who plied his crimson trade across parts of the state. Wike indeed placed a ransom on the head of Waney, who has since been tracked by security personnel and duly decisioned.

About a year later, Wike reached out to the family of Dr. Ferry Gberegbe, who was also killed during the better-forgetten electoral fiasco of March 2019. He provided N200 million for the family. In November 2020, Wike assuaged the grief and despair of the wives of six families, whose breadwinners in military service, were allegedly killed by members of the outlawed Indigenous Peoples’ Of Biafra, (IPOB). Wike was not interested about the state of origin or religion of the deceased servicemen. They lost their lives in the line of duty within the geographical space of Rivers State. He reckoned therefore, that they needed every support to get on with their lives. He availed the six bereaved families of the sum of N200 million.

A year ago, on May 27, 2021, Nyesom Wike was special guest at the groundbreaking ceremony of the “Akwa Ibom State University Teaching Hospital,” in Awa, Onna LGA, next door to Rivers State. Both states are brothers, and leading oil-producing entities. They have both been administered by the PDP since the return of democratic governance in 1999. Wike at the event, pledged the support of his government to the project, to the tune of N600 million. Four months before the Akwa Ibom event, Wike had visited Sokoto State. He was there to sympathise with the people of the state, and his colleague, Aminu Tambuwal about a tragic fire incident which razed thousands of shops, impacting several livelihoods.

Moved by the scale of devastation, Wike advanced the sum of N500 million, as support from the Government and People of Rivers State, towards the rebuilding of the market. Wike has also lent support, now and again, to Benue State. The North Central entity, has been serial victim of inconsiderate, vicious and presumptuous Fulani herdsmen, who think the entire acreage of Nigeria, their allotted grazing ground. Apart from Wike’s initial support of N200 million in 2018 for displaced persons in the state, he has continued to stretch a hand of kinship, to the geopolity, every now and again.

Wike’s large heart reminds of the Nigeria of old where Africa eternally looked up to us for support, leadership and inspiration. From the neighbouring countries of Liberia, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Chad, Guinea, through Sudan, Somalia in Central Africa, eastwards to Kenya, Uganda, and thenceforth to South Africa to Zimbabwe and Namibia, Africa could barely breathe without Nigeria. Whether it was the battle for political emancipation, amelioration of socioeconomic dislocations, or the resolution of internal or external political turmoil, Nigeria was a constant, behind Africa. It was like the hump which is eternally stuck behind the hunchback, as the Yoruba proverb says.

Expectedly, Wike’s actions have attracted criticisms and recriminations, especially from his domain, Rivers State. He has been criticised for not paying pensions and gratuities to retirees in Rivers State. Independent reports opine that this is not entirely Wike’s fault, though. Indeed, his 2022 “May Day,” address took due cognisance of this and urgent steps are being taken to address the anomalies, which pre-date Wike’s dispensation. He has also been accused of abandoning the maintenance of government infrastructures, notably the State Secretariat, *Point Block,* the hub of state bureaucracy. Environmental management has also become an issue of public concern, given the level of filth and degradation in the erstwhile “Garden City” Port Harcourt, the showpiece of the state.

What Wike has done with regards to his famous fiscal liberalism, however, is to expose the thieves, pilferers and gluttons amongst our political elite. He has taken a subtle dig at governors who perennially encamp in Abuja to ambush allocations to their states from the automated transmission machine, (ATM), of the federal government. They subsequently abduct and domicile bureau de change operators in the bedrooms of their Abuja homes, to convert popular resources, into foreign currencies, for their personal consumption and onward transmission to foreign vaults. They spontaneously throw up their hands in dramatised despair, announcing their inability to meet statutory obligations because of diminishing resources. These fellows do not only devour our collective patrimony, they also gobble the plates, pots and pans with which they are served.

These fellows are in permanent liaison with project contractors for the inflation of the bills of quantities and the upfront receipt of mega percentage cuts from every contract which comes under their red ink. This does not preclude the mind-boggling portions of state funds they appropriate to themselves as “first line charge,” in the name of spurious, even scurrilous “security votes.” Many governors have been known to prioritize their loot, over and above the emoluments of poor workers, and the delivery of basic services. Wike has demonstrated that the resources may not suffice to fulfill government’s ever broadening canvas of obligations. Properly managed and deployed, however, so much can be achieved and relevant developmental sectors impacted with the bit at hand.

Wike has unwittingly expanded the possibilities for increased collaboration between states in the country, the type experimented between Lagos and Kebbi states which berthed *LAKE* rice, a few years ago. While Lagos provided the resources, Kebbi provided the land for mass cultivation of rice in its infinite landmass. Wike will not be governor forever, but he has in a way opened up fronts for further conversations between his successors and various other states. Why wouldn’t Rivers and Akwa Ibom for instance, collaborate on the actualisation of mutually beneficial causes, like information technology and industrial parks, as different from oil and gas per se? If former President Olusegun Obasanjo has luminous stretches of fruit farms in Benue State, why not a Rivers/Benue venture which incorporates cultivation, production and processing of various agricultural products?

At the launch of a book titled *The Arc of the Possible* authored by Waziri Adio last December, I met Muyiwa Adekeye, a journalist. He is a younger alumnus of my alma mater, the University of Ilorin, by the way. It’s always a delight for me to meet fellow alumni, irrespective of their generation. Having graduated from the same institution four decades ago, it’s an enriching experience sharing cross-generational perspectives with others. What intrigued me the most was that Adekeye, a Yoruba man, is media adviser to Nasir El Rufai, governor of Kaduna State. Just like the Ben Akabuezes and the Joe Igbokwes have featured in governments in Lagos State, the trend of some intercultural integration is gaining some traction afterall. We should hear of an *Ikwerre* man as local government chairman in Sokoto State, someday, with the unintended foundations laid by a Wike. This is the way Nigeria should be.

Tunde Olusunle, PhD, poet, journalist, author and scholar, is a Member of the Nigerian Guild of Editors, (NGE).

Opinion

BENUE 2027:The Apa/Agatu Quest for Equity

Published

5 days ago

January 14, 2025

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By Tunde Olusunle

It may be well over two years to the next cycle of general elections in Nigeria. For the people of Apa/Agatu federal constituency in *Benue South, however, the measure of their participation and integration into the governance scheme will be defined in the run-up to the general polls that year. Nine local government areas make up the predominantly Idoma country of Benue State also labelled Zone C in the senatorial tripod of the geo-polity. The zone is also home to the Igede ethnic stock and the Etulo. Local government areas in “Benue Zone C” include: Apa, Agatu, Oju, Obi, Ado, Ogbadibo, Okpokwu, Otukpo and Ohimini. The other zones, Benue North East and Benue North West, are wholly dominated by the Tiv nationality, striding across 14 local government areas. They are christened Zone A and Zone B in the local political scheme of the state. Federal constituencies in Benue South are: Apa/Agatu, Oju/Obi; Ado/Ogbadibo/Opokwu and Otukpo/Ohimini.

The subjugation of groups and ethnicities considered demographically smaller, by the larger groups which has dominated Nigeria’s politics over time, has not been any different for the Idoma of Benue State. Until the circumstantial emergence of a Yahaya Bello from the Ebira ethnicity in Kogi State in 2015, the Igala had the relay baton of governorship of Kogi State, in rounds and succession. The Ebiras and the Okun-Yoruba zones in the state could only aspire to be serial deputies or Secretaries to the State Government. This political template was virtually cast in stone. The Ilorin people of Kwara State have similarly wholly warehoused the gubernatorial office, sparingly conceding the position to other sociocultural groups in the state. The only exception was the concession of the seat to a candidate from Kwara South, in the person of Abdulfatah Ahmed, by his predecessor, Bukola Saraki in 2011. Even at that, there were murmurs and dissent from those who believed Ahmed came from a community too close to the Ilorin emirate to be of genuine Igbomina stock, which prides itself as the pure Yoruba species in Kwara State.
Twenty-six years into the Fourth Republic, the maximum proximity of the Idoma to Government House, Makurdi, has been by the customary allocation of the Deputy Governor’s slot to its people. Ogirri Ajene from Oju/Obi, the charismatic blue-blood of blessed memory, was deputy to George Akume, incumbent Secretary to the Government of the Federation, (SGF), from 1999 to 2007. Akume it was reported, genuinely desired to be succeeded by Ajene who exhibited competence and loyalty and could build on their legacies. The Tiv nation we understand, shot down the proposal. Gabriel Suswam succeeded Akume and had the urbane multipreneur, Stephen Lawani from Ogbadibo as deputy. Samuel Ortom, a Minister in the Goodluck Jonathan presidency who took over from Suswam opted for Benson Abounu, an engineer from Otukpo as running mate, while Hyacinth Alia, the Catholic priest who succeeded Ortom, also chose as deputy, Samuel Ode, who was also a Minister in the Jonathan government, from Otukpo. Arising from this precedence, Apa/Agatu has not for once, been considered for a place in Government House, Makurdi.
In similar fashion, the position of Senator representing Benue South, has repeatedly precluded Apa/Agatu federal constituency. David Alechenu Bonaventure Mark a former army General from Otukpo, took the first shot at the office in 1999. He was to remain in the position for five consecutive times, a distinctive record by Nigerian standards. Mark would subsequently become President of the Senate and the third most senior political office holder in the nation’s governance scheme for a string of two terms between 2007 and 2015. He was replaced by Patrick Abba Moro, who hails from Okpokwu and was a former teacher, in 2019. Abba Moro who previously served as Minister of Interior in the Jonathan government from 2011 to 2015, won a second term at the 2023 general elections and remains substantive Senator for “Benue Zone C.” He is indeed incumbent Minority Leader of the Senate, and thus a principal officer in the leadership scheme of the “red chambers.”
While Moro is barely two years into his second term, there are suggestions that he is interested in a third term which should run from 2027 to 2031! This is the core issue which has dominated contemporary political discourse in Benue South, especially from the Apa/Agatu bloc. For Apa/Agatu, it is bad enough that they are repeatedly bypassed in the nomination of deputy governors in the scheme of state politics. It is worse that they are equally subjugated by their own kinsmen within the context of politics in *Idoma and Igede land.* This is particularly worrying when both local government areas constituting the Apa/Agatu federal constituency, Apa and Agatu, are not in anyway deficient in human resources to represent Benue South. Names like John Elaigwu Odogbo, the incumbent *Och’Idoma* and respected clergy; Isa Innocent Ekoja, renowned Professor and Librarian; Sonny Togo Echono, FNIA, OON, Executive Secretary, Tertiary Education Trust Fund, (TETFUND), and John Mgbede, Emeritus State Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), Benue State, readily come to mind.
Major General R.I. Adoba, (rtd), a former Chief Training and Operations in the Nigerian Army; Professor Emmanuel Adanu, former Director of the Kaduna-based National Water Resources Institute, (NWRI) and the US-based specialist in internal medicine, Dr Raymond Audu, are eminent Apa/Agatu constituents. There are also Ada Egahi, long-serving technocrat who retired from the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency, (NPHDA), and Super Eagles forward, Moses Simon, (why not, hasn’t the retired soccer star, George Opong Weah just completed his term as President of Liberia)? The Member Representing Apa/Agatu in the House of Representatives, Godday Samuel Odagboyi, an office previously held by Solomon Agidani, as well as Adamu Ochepo Entonu, is, like his predecessors, a prominent figure from the resourceful Apa/Agatu federal constituency.
The Olofu brothers, Tony Adejoh, a retired Assistant Inspector General of Police, (AIG), and David, PhD, a renowned management and financial strategist, who is also an Emeritus Member of the Benue State Executive Council during the Ortom dispensation, are from the same federal constituency. So is Abu Umoru, a serial entrepreneur who represents Apa State Constituency in the Benue State House of Assembly. The continuing intra-zonal alienation of Apa-Agatu from the politics of Benue Zone C, remains a sore thumb which must be clinically diagnosed and intentionally treated in the run-up to 2027.
If previous top level political office holders from Idomaland in general and Apa/Agatu in particular, had diligently applied themselves to tangible, multisectoral development of the zone and constituency, the present clamour for inclusiveness would probably been less vociferous. *River Agatu* which flows from Kogi State, and runs through Agatu before emptying into *River Benue,* is a potential game changer in the socioeconomy of Apa/Agatu, Benue South and Benue State in general. Properly harnessed, it can revolutionise agriculture and aquaculture in the state, beyond subsistence levels which are the primary vocations of the indigenous people. Rice, yam, guinea corn, millet and similar grains, thrive in the fertile soils of the area. These can support “first level” processing of produce and guarantee value addition beneficial to the primary producers, before being shipped to other markets. River Agatu can indeed be dammed to provide hydro-electricity to power the entire gamut of Idomaland.
The infrastructure deficit in Benue South with specific reference to Apa/Agatu is equally very concerning. A notable pattern in Nigerian politics is its self-centeredness, the penchant for political players to prioritise their personal wellbeing and the development of their immediate space. This has accentuated the ever recurring desire of people to ascend the political pedestals of their predecessors if that is the principal window by which they can also privilege their own primary constituents. Motorable roads are non-existent, seamless travel between communities therefore encumbered. Expectedly this has been a major impediment to subsistent trade and social engagements between constituents and their kinsmen. Primary health facilities are almost non-existent, compelling people to flock to Otukpo, headquarters of Benue South, for the minutest of medical advice and treatment.
Apa/Agatu pitiably bleeds from the relentless and condemnable activities of vagrants and bandits who have reduced the constituency into a killing field. Reports suggest that in the past 15 years, no less than 2500 lives were lost to the vicious attacks of marauders and trespassers in the area under reference. This unnerving situation has compelled engagements between concerned Apa/Agatu leaders, and the leadership of the Nigeria Police Force, (NPF). The prayer is for the swift establishment of a mobile police outpost in the troubled sub-zone to contain bloodletting. The proposal, anchored by AIG Tony Olofu, NPOM, (rtd), and Echono, has received the blessings of the police high command. At the last update, a commander for the outfit had been named, while the deployment of personnel had begun in earnest.
It is very clear that in the march towards 2027, Apa/Agatu will refuse, very vehemently, to be sidelined and trampled upon in the political scheme of their senatorial zone. Abba Moro may desire a third term in the Senate, but the people of Apa/Agatu are quick to remind him that his curriculum vitae as a politician is sufficiently sumptuous for him to yield the seat in the “red chambers” and sit back like an elder statesman. They remind you that for a man who began his working life modestly as a lecturer in the Federal Polytechnic, Ugbokolo in 1991, Abba Moro has done extremely well for himself in Nigerian politics. For reminders, Abba Moro was elected Chairman of Okpokwu local government in the state as far back as 1998. Ever since, he has remained a permanent fixture in Nigeria’s national politics.
The people of Apa/Agatu will put up a determined fight for the Benue South senatorial seat in 2027, and no one should begrudge them. They are the proverbial ram which was pushed to the wall, which must of necessity push back with angered horns to liberate itself. They are already engaging with their kith across “Benue Zone C” to ensure that intra-zonal equity, fairness and justice, prevails in communal politics.

Tunde Olusunle, PhD, Fellow of the Association of Nigerian Authors, (FANA), teaches Creative Writing at the University of Abuja

Opinion

The Prince Adebayo prescriptions for ease of doing Business: 15 Take-Aways

Published

5 days ago

January 14, 2025

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By Dr. Ag Zaki

On Thursday, 9 January 2025, Prince Adewole Adebayo presented a keynote address at the Radisson Blu Hotel, Ikeja, Lagos. The occasion was the annual conference of a group of professionals, business executives and experts codenamed J9C for January 9 Collective. The theme of the Conference was “Business and Policy Strategy: Examining the Role of Reform in enhancing the ease of doing business in Nigeria.” Prince Adebayo is a versatile cerebral man of many parts, a lawyer, a multimedia practitioner, a real estate investor, a large-scale miner, a philanthropist, a community developer, and the 2023 Presidential Candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP). The organisers of the J9C conference introduced him as an intercontinental lawyer because he currently practices law in over sixteen countries.

The full speech of Prince Adebayo at the occasion is available online and can be accessed by clicking at this url: https://youtu.be/SsHkcJbVNRg?si=ebvoOVqGh0zVOsnt or by scanning the QR code above. However, we are presenting the salient take-aways from this most incisive keynote address below for the convenience of interested persons and for the public good.

THE TAKE-AWAYS
Preamble
1. Not every change of policy or programme is a reform. A reform is a fundamental change in the activities, programmes, and policies structured to cause improvement. Genuine government reforms are people oriented and so citizens can interject, comment or contribute.
2. Reform may be internally motivated, externally forced or imposed, or technological driven.
3. The government of Nigeria must first reform itself to be able to implement development-oriented reforms to improve the country’s economic performance.

In general terms
4. Fiscal and monetary reforms are critical and are urgently required in Nigeria. While government can freely control its fiscal reforms, it must be bound by market forces for realistic and realisable monetary reforms.
5. Economic reforms must positively affect developmental policies, programmes and projects to engender economic growth, increase in efficiency, and lead to stability. Economic and political reforms must be implemented pari-passu for untainted policies and programmes.
6. Urgent structural reforms are required in areas of legal reforms, laws on banking controls and regulations, lending and borrowing as well as land matters.

In specific terms
7. Reforms which are aimed at targeting ease of doing business must be aligned with the Malam Aminu Kano maxim that “all civil servants should abstain from contracts or business”.
8. Nigeria must break the current odious and unwholesome conspiracies between policy makers, civil servants, and contractors, which can lead to irreversible endemic corruption, long foreseen by the revered Malam Aminu Kano, and which can permanently damage the economy.
9. Structural reforms must ensure that land laws open up maximum benefits and potentials of the land, encourage labour productivity and efficient and transparent entrepreneurship rules including registration, capital and lending matters.
10. Tax reforms should be broad-based, not about sharing of revenue but promoting productivity and competitiveness in all aspects of endeavours and infrastructure reforms should make transportation of people and goods safe and cost effective.
11. Monitoring economic crimes must be thorough and should go beyond arresting of “Yahoo boys” and those spraying Naira notes, but those devaluing the Naira and abusing economic rules and regulations.

Warnings
12. Adebayo left some stern terse warnings for the business sector and for the government of Nigeria.
13. Business executives and professionals should not ask or encourage government for specific reforms but for general broad-based reforms as firm-specific reforms can enhance operations of specific firms or business in the short term but will ultimately kill the industry.
14. Government should not meddle into business or be guided by partisan businessmen; government should meet business only at the junction of regulatory framework.
15. Government should be selfless and honest in carrying out reforms, incorporate measurable performance indices and ensure that reforms are implemented in a way not to inflict pains or punishment on the people.

# DrZaki25, 903 Tafawa Balewa Way, Abuja

Opinion

Governor Monday Okpebholo: A Blessing to Edo State

Published

6 days ago

January 13, 2025

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Monday Okpebholo

By Eigbefo Felix

His Excellency, Senator Monday Okpebholo, the Executive Governor of Edo State, has demonstrated that he is a blessing to the state through his policies, appointments, initiation of road construction across the three senatorial districts, and his deep love for the people of Edo State.

Governor Monday Okpebholo has begun fulfilling the five-point agenda he promised the good people of the state since his inauguration.

In the area of security, he has shown total commitment. He assured the people of Edo State that he would ensure their safety, and true to his word, the state remains peaceful, which has brought joy to its residents. He has provided the necessary support to security personnel.

The governor increased the subvention for Ambrose Alli University (AAU) from ₦40 million to ₦500 million. He also promised to address the issues facing AAU medical students. Additionally, he has started renovating primary and secondary schools across the state, underscoring his understanding of the importance of education.

The agricultural sector has taken a positive turn as Governor Okpebholo has allocated ₦70 billion to the sector. Recognizing agriculture’s importance to both the state and the nation, he is positioning Edo State to become the food basket of the nation with his investments in the sector.

During the electioneering period, Senator Okpebholo promised to create 5,000 jobs within his first 100 days in office. He has already begun the process, and soon, the people of Edo State will benefit from these employment opportunities. Unlike in the past, he will not rely on MOUs before making appointments. Furthermore, he has started appointing Edo State indigenes, rather than outsiders, to various positions.

Governor Okpebholo has commenced road projects across the state, from Edo South to Edo Central and Edo North. He believes that when roads are motorable, the prices of goods in the market will automatically reduce.

He has also begun investing in the health sector, understanding its critical importance to the people of Edo State.

Governor Monday Okpebholo’s initiatives and actions affirm his dedication to transforming Edo State for the better.