A bailout governor and destination wedding

Oyo State has been very much in my mind this week since I had an encounter with photos of the latest destination wedding organised by the state governor, Abiola Ajimobi, for one of his daughters.  It appears the state has not been fortunate with the right kind of leadership since the exit of the late Lam Adeshina. Don’t get me wrong, there are great people in Oyo State, but I’m worried that the state under its present leadership could make partying in Beirut, Lebanon, a serious affair than the governance of the state. How can a governor whose state is struggling with financial crisis dare to insult the sensibility of his people by going to do offshore wedding for his daughter?

Just last week, Ajimobi admitted that his government was in shambles financial wise. He admitted to the financial mess he’s sitting on as a governor, when he told a presenter on a radio station that, “Next (this) week, we should be able to access the Federal Government bailout of N26.6bn. As of today, we owe the state workers N21.3bn but all we could get from the bailout is N17.3bn. So if we get the money today, we will still have to look for more money to balance the account so that all the debt can be paid.”

Ajimobi said government should take a sheer size of the blame for the economic woes facing Nigeria. According to him, “We should blame the culture of spending without saving, lifestyles of Nigerians, ourselves and government for the position we find ourselves today. We have not managed the economy well but government should take the larger blame. So much money had been stolen.’’

Do you take Ajimobi serious, when he speaks? No. I don’t. One follow-up question to his treatise on the bailout issue is: who stole the money in Oyo State since Ajimobi only succeeded himself and not any other person or party?

During his last campaign, Ajimobi promised free education to his people, but now he has backtracked.  A few days ago, he made a surprised “change” in his education policy. He cancelled the government sponsorship of the final examination for the senior secondary school students and in addition introduced N3,000 levies to be paid annually by the students in Oyo State. Not only has the governor stopped WAEC fees, but at the same time, in what looks like a clueless policy, he also re-introduced tuition fees in public schools.

In the new arrangement, primary school pupils will be paying N3,000 education development levy per session, which will be paid in three installments of N1, 000 per term. This poor policy is Ajimobi’s response to “abysmal academic performance” of students in Oyo State.

How do you respond to an outdated idea such as this? Let’s look at the United States. That is a country that is far gone is education policy. Primary and secondary education are not only free, children equally enjoy free ride to and fro whenever school is in session. Only recently, when the US government realised that people from certain race in the country are not enrolling for college education as expected, it started to promote the idea of free education up to the first two years of college (university). The Oyo State example is a bad example for governance in south-west Nigeria.

And that idea that development levy should be paid for students to be serious with their education is obviously for lack of ideas. What happened to the taxes being paid by the residents?  Any state government that knows its onions must be creative about how to fund elementary and secondary education, if such state must be ranked high in development.

I’m embarrassed that Ajimobi as a governor could leave Nigeria to go and organise wedding for his daughter abroad. It makes mockery of leadership in Nigeria. That simply says something about his political party as well: lack of discipline. I know a number of people may find words to describe it as “once in a lifetime thing,” but not when a state governor is unable to pay salaries or fix deplorable education system and needs to rely on a bailout to get things done. That is unjustifiable. If you take major federal government infrastructure out of Oyo State today, the capital in particular, you’ll likely see a rustic state. Ajimobi has not impressed me so far, although he’s got that opportunity and exposure as someone who had lived and studied in the United States. It is saddening that a man who observed Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s legacy of development and took part in the social opportunities it provided will be removing social opportunities from this generation and still don’t care a hoot about what people think. That is not leadership.

This article first appeared in THISDAY