The Peoples Democratic Party has
advised Osun State Governor, Mr. Rauf
Aregbesola, to suspend his plans to
create additional 39 local council
development areas.
The Director of Media and Strategy of
the PDP in Osun State, Mr. Diran
Odeyemi, gave this advice in a
statement in Osogbo on Sunday.
According to the opposition party, the
situation on the ground now does not
call for creation of new councils when
the existing ones are suffering from
underfunding and could not make
positive impact on the lives of the
people at the grassroots.
The statement partly read, “The reality
in Osun calls for serious planning
because the economy of the state now
or even in near future cannot cope with
69 local government councils when the
state could not generate fund to
develop the existing 30 councils.
“This is a poorly conceived idea lacking
the understanding and needs of the
people of Osun State while its proposed
execution at this time shows that
Governor Aregbesola has lost ideas of
what is next in the state.
“The rest of the country must be
astonished about a governor that has
not been able to fulfill its financial
obligations to the workforce and plunge
the state economy into a crisis, but
interestingly planning to create new
councils to make Osun as the only state
in Nigeria to have 69 councils.”
The last House of Assembly which had
all its members from the ruling party
had some days before the expiration of
its tenure passed a bill establishing 39
additional local development areas . This
followed the outcome of a referendum
conducted by the Osun State
Independent Electoral Commission.
This was preceded by the bill sent to
the House by the governor to seek the
lawmakers’ approval for the creation of
the new council areas.
The PDP stated that rather than taking
into consideration the peculiar needs of
Osun State and its financial capacity, the
governor was busy copying Lagos State’s
programmes even when they were not
needed in the state.
“Copying Lagos notes is affecting Osun
negatively. Buying helicopter, creating
LCDAs, planting flowers are all Lagos
ideas. Aregbesola is running Osun as a
sole administrator. In his first term, it
took him almost one year before he
could constitute his cabinet.
“Again 10 months into his second term,
the cabinet has not been formed and
may not be formed at all for obvious
reasons. Even, when his commissioners
were in office, the whole state knows he
does not listen to their suggestions. He
governs the state as a sole
administrator,” the opposition party
added.
Effort to get the reaction of the
governor to the PDP’s advice was
unsuccessful as inquiry sent to his media
aide, Mr. Semiu Okanlawon, was still
being expected as of the time of filing
this report.
But the Speaker of the House of
Assembly, Mr. Najeem Salaam, had
while passing the bill said that the new
councils were created for administrative
conveniences.
The speaker, who urged the governor to
prioritise giving his assent to the bill for
the creation of the councils, said their
creation “became imperative in order to
bring government closer to the
grassroots.
“The primary purpose of the creation of
the councils and administrative units
was for the administrative
conveniences, not to hyper-bloat the
already existing over-bloated civil and
political regimes which have become an
albatross to the limited resources of the
state.”



http://www.punchng.com/news/pdp-to-aregbesola-stop-creation-of-39-new-councils/

OP, add the link so l can visit the page on Punch.

Aregbe and the burden of cluelessness ...



Pray, tell who is his right sense will embark on creation of additional LCDAs in this austerity period ?


Just like the tallest drum, this is another misplaced priority by the confused and beggarly governor ...