AN OPEN LETTER TO GOVERNOR SANWO OLU OF LAGOS STATE ON THE OCCASION OF HIS SECOND YEAR IN OFFICE : A CELEBERATION OF INEPTITUDE.
on June 11, 2021
Dear Governor Sanwo Olu,
When asked to appraise the performance of your administration in 2020, I declined. My thinking at the time was that you had not done much in your first year in office because you were a slow starter, but after reading the account of your stewardship this year, your second year in office, one can state categorically that you are not just a slow starter, but that you are indeed a none starter.!
Your ” State of The State ” Address at Lagos House, Ikeja on 27th May, 2021 was an exercise in frivolous hyperbole. As the poet would put it, ‘ it was full of sound and fury, signifying nothing’. Your own testimony rendering an account of two years of stewardship to Lagos State exposed the dismal failure of your administration.
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In the critical sectors of education, health and sanitation, you had nothing to say. And the areas you addressed: the economy, transportation and security were done in a cavalier manner. You could not claim to have achieved any meaningful progress. All you were able to do was make unfounded promises of performing better in the future.
Consider the shallowness of your submission on Transportation, Security and the Economy:
On Transportation you promised to complete in two years, the Lagos State rail system which no one in your Party has been able to do in over ten years. Similarly, Construction of the fourth mainland bridge which past APC administrations have been unable to deliver for the past ten years will miraculously be completed in two years !
You want to build bus stops and buy more buses without considering the fact that you have not built the roads for those buses to travel on.
On Security; as far as you are concerned, fiting the Nigeria police with gadgets is providing security in Lagos. Meanwhile your colleagues in the South West are advancing the concept of State policing, and adopting ‘Amotekun ‘as a temporary self-help measure.
As for developing the economy, you are only able to see rice mills as sources of employment. You are unaware of the need to provide corporations with incentives in exchange for Youth employment, or the diversification of the State’s economy to include agriculture, and mining of minerals currently held in the Federal government’s exclusive list.
Dear Governor, The State of Lagos State is not good, and sad to say, under your watch things have gone from bad to worse.!
You have rehabilitated fewer roads than any governor in twenty years,consequently roads are flooded after just a few minutes of rain. School buildings are inundated with water any time of the year. Homes and other infrastructure across the state are constantly in peril, and Land erosion is expanding, all because of your failure to embark on a universal drainage system.
The menace of traffic congestion is back with a vengeance. Lagos is an island, surrounded by water, yet you have only paid lip service to developing water transportation. Travel time has increased by 25% in the last year alone, causing hardship for citizens, and damaging the State’s economy. After all, as the saying goes,’ time is money ‘!
In the area of Health, Lagosians are deathly afraid of getting sick because the cost of medications and hospital bills are in themselves able to induce a heart attack. Too many People die everyday waiting for treatment in overcrowded, and ill equipped hospitals, or even just because they cannot afford prescribed drugs.
In what way have your efforts been geared towards ensuring Youth employment as proclaimed in your address? Have you provided an enabling atmosphere for primary school children, huddled up like wet chickens in overcrowded class rooms whenever rain falls ? Have you built any vocational or technical schools, or invest in the existing ones ? Did you decrease fees of polytechnic institutions, or upgrade their facilities ? Have you been magnanimous like Governor Makinde of Oyo State who saw the absurdity of paying Youth Coppers 5,000 naira per month, and increased their allowance to 15,000.?
You have fared no better in the education sector . Your claim to fame in this area is turning Lagos State University, the state’s premier institution of Higher Learning into a political battle field in an effort to impose policy and personnel on the institution.
The adage that ‘Education is the antidote to poverty’ does not seem to resonate with you. Precious little has been invested in education, consequently Youth Unemployment in Lagos has risen to an all-time high of 40%.The youth who are the embodiment of any society’s future survival, in Lagos constitute about 60% of our population. By empoverishing the youth as the inept policies of your administration have done, you have inadvertently empoverished all the people of Lagos, and put the future of the state in jeopardy.
Throughout the past two years, Lagosians have witnessed several cases of government abuse of power and transgressions against the principles of democracy.
Four examples should suffice. (1) during your party primaries this may, you rigged out all challengers from Oki – Banire caucus within APC.In what has become a pattern, you paved the way for your hand picked candidates only to emerge at the general election; the PDP, the main opposition party,as well as others having been sidelined. This is a strategy which you have perfected for rigging Elections. Part of this election rigging plot is ensuring that Lagos State Independent Election Commission (LASIEC) is headed by an old reliable puppet of yours.
(2) A similar rigging process brought in Abiru in as Senator of East Senatorial District in December 2020 .
(3) In October 2020, you allegedly ordered a brutal clamp down on # END SARRS activists who were peacefully calling for an end to police brutality , and demanding better accountability from their government. The jury is still out on how many young people lost their lives that terrible day !
(4) And arguably the most egregious of all is your determination to promulgate a State law which would in effect shield your political godfather, Bola Ahmed Tinubu from criminal prosecution. EFCC has instituted a case against Tinubu for stealing billions of naira from Lagos State through his ALPHA BETA, Company and you, the governor , the Chief Law Enforcement officer of the state is standing in the way of the law by trying to prevent EFCC from having jurisdiction over Tinubu’s trial !
My purpose for writing this letter is not to deride you, nor is it politically motivated. I just want Lagosians to see the truth, and hopefully help you to come to terms with your shortcomings. Perhaps with that you would be encouraged to do better.
My narrative on the degrading quality of life in Lagos, and the suffering of Lagosians, was recently substantiated by a report from the ‘ Economist Intelligence Unit’ (https://naira metrics.com/2021/06/09), which places Lagos as the second worst City to live in the world. According to this survey conducted around five broad issues of Stability, Health Care, Environment, Education and infrastructure, only war-torn Damascus in Syria is worse than Lagos!
Mr Governor, despite the clear and urgent evidence of your People’s suffering, you have the audacity to tell them that they should be happy because they have never had it so good.
In your own words, ” We are exceedingly happy with the progress we have made in the last two years. Our accomplishments have placed us at a vantage position from where we can now catch a Glimpse of the Greater Lagos we envisioned together” What a sham !
The dismal performance of your administration over these two years is evidence of a lack of capacity. Your acceptance of this State of disrepair as success tells us that you have extremely low expectations for yourself and for Lagos.
Regretfully, your flaws are smaller indications of a larger problem. Your’s are merely symptoms. The actual disease is your political Party ; The All Progressives Congress (APC). This Political Party with the ignoble Bola Ahmed Tinubu as its National Leader has held absolute control over Lagos State politics for the past twenty years. And in living up to the unfortunate saying that ” Power Corrupts , and Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, it has become Absolutely Corrupt !
It is incumbent on all well meaning people to come to the rescue. Together we must bring an end to APC’S decades of misrule. Let us pledge in upcoming elections to vote for a political Party, able to field God fearing visionary candidates with progressive plans to move Lagos forward.
Adetokunbo Pearse, Phd. Public Affairs Analyst, PDP Stakeholder