When late Senator Abiola Ajimobi became the governor of Oyo State in 2011, he met a court case hanging over the conduct of election to the local governments in the state. The late Governor had to fill the local governments with caretaker committees to oversee the administration of the local governments. For six years, spreading from his first term to second term, the caretaker committees kept having their short tenures renewed until it was clear to conduct elections to have executive chairmen and other elective officers administering the local governments a year or two to the end of late former Governor’s second tenure.
While the caretaker committees held sway across the 33 local governments and about 56 LCDAs created by law under late Senator Abiola Ajimobi, people at the grassroots did not suffer the dearth of dividends of democratic governance. In his urban renewal drive, while Senator Abiola Ajimobi concentrated his road infrastructural developments in the urban centres, the caretaker committees he appointed to man the local governments concentrated on local/rural roads. To lend evidential credence to the strides the caretaker committees made in road construction, reconstruction, rehabilitation and repair in their respective local/rural domains, it’s important to highlight road infrastructures done by each of the caretaker chairman appointed by His Excellency, late Senator Abiola Ajimobi.
In Ibadan South East Local Government, two eminent politicians were appointed at different times as caretaker chairmen to administer Ibadan South East Local Government. Hon Bolaji Najeemdeen Gbayawu was the first caretaker chairman Senator Ajimobi appointed before the late governor later appointed Hon Bimbo Omiyale who also later got elected as the executive chairman of the local government. Between the two former chairmen, the following roads were constructed, reconstructed, repair and rehabilitated across Wards 1 to 12 in the local government.
1. Rehabilitation of Eleta Junction to Idi-Arere
2. Repair of Omiyale Road
3. Rehabilitation of Alagbala to Oju-Odo Oke-Irorun
4. Construction of Eyin Grammar to Odo-Oba
5. Rehabilitation of Molete Iso-Adie to Eyin Grammar
6. Construction of Iya Saidi Alamala-Ola Mummy-Lati Oloole Road in Odo-Oba
7. Rehabilitation of Olorunsogo to Express after Orita Aperin
8. Repair of Lam Adesina Street
9. Construction of Road beside Arapaja House to Lagelu Estate at Felele
10. Construction of Express to Sodun and Sodun to CAC
11. Rehabilitation of Idi-Aro to Asanike Junction.
Highlighted above are, verifiably, some of the roads constructed, reconstructed and rehabilitated by the caretaker chairmen of Ibadan South East Local Government under the administration of late Senator Abiola Ajimobi. The roads are there now for public use and they keep making vehicular and human movements easier in the areas where the roads are domiciled. The late APC Governor did not starve the local government chairmen of funds needed to give infrastructural dividends to the grassroots.
In the same Ibadan South East Local Government at, Mr Emmanuel Alawode was the caretaker chairman appointed by Gov Makinde and is now the elected executive chairman. After almost three years in at the helms in the local government, people need to ask him why his administration has not constructed, reconstructed or rehabilitated any road. So far, his administration is starving the people of Ibadan South East desirable dividends of democracy in the area of road infrastructures which would have eased human and vehicular movements across the local government.
Since the administration of Gov Seyi Makinde assumed office on 29th May, 2019, till now when the administration will clock 3 years in office in a little over two months from now, local government administrations have been on induced holidays while people at the grassroots are becoming the worse for it, groaning under the maladministration the present government has brought upon Oyo local governments. Gov Makinde, on assuming office, appointed caretaker committees to run the affairs of the local governments, having unjustly sacked the chairmen and the councillors legally elected by OYSIEC under Ajimobi administration. Gov Makinde later had elections conducted into the local governments by the OYSIEC he inaugurated. Since almost three years, a year as caretaker chairmen and almost two years as elected executive chairmen, no road has been seen to be constructed, reconstructed and rehabilitated in any of the local governments across the state. This is not to say that the present elected chairmen have not been carrying out pockets of token projects according to paltry funds allegedly being released to them by Gov Makinde.
It has now appeared that Oyo local governments fared better under the appointed caretaker committees under late Gov Ajimobi than the elected executives under Gov Makinde.
