Oyo State Governor Mr Seyi Makinde Speaks about his first Month in office
The expenditure of the previous admin was not as expected, N2B was approved for 1 KM of road but we are progressive and we will concentrate on the task ahead. They appointed a HoS we decided to keep her. In February, a car was purchased for the former HoS, the car is gone now.
Our main focus is to improve IGR in Oyo State. If they don't desist from disturbing our administration I will expose them publicly and the people of Oyo State can judge. We have been focused on doing what we were elected to do.
On the LAUTECH issue, I appeal for patience. I am aware of the issues. All these issues will be looked into and resolved.
If NURTW are ready to be peaceful, I'll lift the ban. I don't want a single soul to be lost during my watch. We will ensure that anyone who won't maintain peace is dealt with decisively by the law.
We can boost IGR by using LGA to collect the revenue that NURTW are collecting.
We don't want to do it at the expense of the people of Oyo State. We need to improve and upgrade the bus garages before we can starting charging or collecting revenue.
Before we clock 100 days in the office you will see some of these improvements to the bus garages.
On stolen property;
If anyone has taken anything belonging to the state, it should be returned. So far, I can confirm that the past government were in debt of N150B. FAAC allocation is N4.5B/month. Salary is N5.5B/month. The deficit is N1.5B.
On the N3,000 fee cancellation, I told Oyo State people where we will get the money to fund the amount realised from that payment during the campaigns. It's about plugging leakages. Right now, there's some money we are expecting which was confiscated in one person's account.
The money will fund one year of these fees for senior secondary school students. And the N3,000 stays in the pocket of the poor people who can't even afford to pay it in the first place.
The SSG who was just appointed is female & educated that's what gave her the opportunity to get the role. We want children to be educated, male &female as this will open up opportunities for them. For the first time in Oyo State, the SSG & HOS are female. Education got them there
Under the law in Nigeria, basic education, primary to JSS 3 is free and compulsory. The reason we cancelled the N3,000 fees for senior secondary school is to encourage more people to go back to school. We have a high number of out of school children and need them back in school.
A dirty environment increases disease and sickness. We have set up a taskforce to engage the contractors to make sure they are doing the right thing. Until we review the contract signed, we will continue using the current contractors and I want people to cooperate with them.
On travelling often
It is all official work. E.g. I was with UBEC to negotiate the release of
N2.5B yet to be paid to Oyo State. This was paid on Thursday. I made a promise to put Oyo State first & that's exactly what I’m doing whether I’m in Ibadan or not I’m constantly working
I'm going to organise LGA election before the end of 1st quarter of next year. We will not break the law because of the formation of LGA. The sacking of LGA Chairmen is in court , so I can’t talk much about this but what ever the court decides we will follow it.
33 LGAs are legally recognised. 35 LCDAs issue is still in court. They took the FG to court, why conduct an election? LCDA is a concept I don’t agree with initially, but I’ll let it be for now. LCDA chairmen don’t even work except to collect salary at the end of the month.
On rumours of a rift in the coalition:
There are no issues at all, we had a meeting few days ago, things are going as planned.
The last admin didn’t respond to our request for information, they said they're in govt until the ‘last day.’ That's why we spent the last month getting details from departments and ministries. Within next 10-14 days we should have everything in place including the commissioners.
Most of the appointments made after the election were reversed. The only one not reversed was the Head of Service. I have always insisted that any good thing done by past admin I will retain.
E.g the road from Moniya to Iseyin-Olaniran trade was N2B, I have demanded answers. Any contract that is of value to Oyo State, we will continue else it will be stopped. Where we can renegotiate for reduction we will do that, to make sure it's of value to our people.
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