Ondo State Information Commissioner, Honourable Wale Akinlosotu, has described as excellent and reassuring the performance of the Ondo State Governor and All Progressives Congress candidate, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, in the weekend debate organised by Channels TV.
The debate featured Governor Aiyedatiwa and his main rival in the November 16 election, Agboola Ajayi.
In a statement on Monday, the Information Commissioner said that the debate was another opportunity for the governor to showcase his achievements across all sectors of the state economy, which he delivered to the satisfaction of all amid loud ovations from the gathering.
He stated: “The governor’s performance at the debate is a confirmation of the fact that APC has a good candidate, a reliable, tested, and trusted candidate, who has proven his ability to deliver on promises and take the state to greater heights.”
The commissioner, who noted that the electorate was impressed by the governor’s composure in spite of provocations by the PDP candidate, also commended the people of the state for accepting his candidacy, as demonstrated through the support being given to the governor across the 18 local government areas of the state.
The commissioner listed some of Aiyedatiwa’s life-transforming achievements that have made him the candidate to beat in the forthcoming election, including infrastructure development aimed at making life easier for the people and attracting investment to the state in a bid to turn it into a fully industrialised state.
Akinlosotu said that Aiyedatiwa had breathed new life into the education sector through the construction and rehabilitation of school buildings for a conducive learning environment, the provision of necessary amenities and instructional materials, the payment of full WAEC fees, the employment of 2,000 teachers, and the training and retraining of teachers.
The commissioner also took pride in the governor’s achievements in the health sector, including the revamping and upgrading of the state’s healthcare infrastructure, the recent recruitment of health workers for Primary Health Centres in the 203 wards and the secondary health facilities in the 18 local government areas in the state, the enhancement of doctors’ salaries to retain medical personnel, and ensuring access to affordable healthcare through the Orange Health Insurance Scheme (ORANGHIS).
Recall that at the debate on Sunday, Aiyedatiwa sympathised with the opposition PDP for going into the poll with a depleted house. “There is nobody in PDP anymore. All the major political gladiators have left PDP for APC. They are already in APC. That is just it; you can fact-check all of these. All of them have moved to APC.”
According to Honourable Akinlosotu, Aiyedatiwa maintained at the debate that Ondo State had been better under him in the last 10 months; hence, members of the opposition parties were daily defecting to APC to ensure he continues in office beyond 2025.
He said that the people knew that “with my experience, training, exposure, integrity, and character, I have more to offer the people of Ondo State in terms of good governance.”
While responding to a question on the debt profile, Aiyedatiwa said, “Within the 10 months of my assumption of office, if you check the statistics, Ondo State is the second least of states with high debt profiles. Since I came on board, we have not borrowed, and we don’t have the need to borrow for now.”
The governor, who stated that he would build on the existing security network, ensuring the safety of lives and property and maintaining peace in the state, mentioned that he established Amotekun Rangers from the existing Amotekun Corps for the border areas to ensure that the border towns, where there were occasional incursions of criminals into the state, were properly guarded against such.
He said that the security and prevailing peace in the state, in addition to the infrastructure development, had attracted investors to Ondo State, adding that the industrial park facilitated by his administration “has employed almost 4,000 people of Ondo State origin where they produced ethanol from cassava to ethanol.”
The governor, who stated that a cocoa processing factory in the state was producing about 7,000 tonnes of cocoa every month, added that the administration was doing a lot to open up the rural areas “so that farm produce can be brought to the centre for factories for processing. That is one of the things we are doing already through the Rural Access and Agricultural Marketing Project programme.”
He mentioned that the state government cleared lands of about 10,000 hectares at Jughere “to encourage our youths to go back to farming, especially cocoa farming,” adding that investors were being attracted to the palm produce subsector.
According to him, JD Farms at Ore, one of the largest farm produce farmers currently operating in Ondo State, has employed over 3,000 people in the state. He noted that the farm is working to upgrade into milling and refining to produce vegetable oil.
Aiyedatiwa assured the people of the riverine area that he had engaged the Federal Government, following which the Lekki, Lagos, Calabar Highway would pass through the area, adding, “We are going to reclaim land; we are going to protect it and give more land to the people.”
ALSO READ THESE TOP STORIES FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
and then