|
A stingy Governor-General
By Sola Shittu
Reporter,
Ibadan
It
was Governor Gbenga Daniel of Ogun State who made a friendly joke on Governor
Rashidi Ladoja of Oyo State at one
of the ceremonies marking the latter’s 60th birthday celebration before the grand finale at the
amusement park. The Ogidi Omo had told the story of how the celebrant loves to
call himself the Governor-General of the South West governors by virtue of
being the occupant of that historic seat of the late Obafemi Awolowo and the
late Samuel Ladoke Akintola at Ibadan, the political capital of the Yoruba
race. “He loves to call himself the Governor-General”, said Daniel,
adding:
“But
when it comes to taking up the responsibility that is attached to it, he will
quickly say we are one and equal”. The crowd laughed, but Daniel was not
through with Ladoja as he cited another instance about the miserly disposition
of the Oyo State governor. “If we are traveling abroad, while others may
choose to go for the executive class, of course Governor Ladoja will resign
himself to the economy class,” he added. You may say that remark is not
so palatable about the Oyo governor, but wait till you read this one from
the’ baranda’ man in Ibadan, the Are Musulumi, Alhaji Azeez
Arisekola, who narrated the story of how he purchased two cars for Ladoja and
his friend but up till today, “the governor has not paid me delivery
charge”.
The
remarks from these two gentlemen, who are close associates of the governor, go
beyond the boundary of friendly jokes to the realm of public opinion about what
Ladoja prefers to call “prudent” spending by his administration.
Now what is the difference between prudence and meanness, and what is the
boundary between both? In other words, where do the two begin? Contemporary
English Dictionary defines prudence as “the state or quality of being prudent;
wise though before acting,” while the adjective prudent is defined as
“sensible and wise; careful to consider one’s advantage, especially
by avoiding risks, unpleasantness, difficulties etc.
On
the other hand, the word ‘mean’ is an adjective defined by the same
contemporary dictionary as “ungenerous, unwilling to share or help,
unkind; of unpleasant behaviour which others dislike”. It also defines
‘mean’, especially in terms of abilities, as “poor, bad,
bad-tempered; liking to hurt, poor or poor looking, as of building and of low
social position”.
The
poser now is, is Governor Ladoja a prudent governor, mean or stingy governor?
Lest we deviate, stingy is a sister adjective of mean, which the same
dictionary defines as “having or showing unwillingness to give,
especially money”.
One
can remember vividly that one of the allegations of the governor’s
godfather, Chief Lamidi Adedibu, in the heat of the feud between the duo was
that he is stingy. Again, at the inception of the administration, Ladoja reduced the wages of political
office holders by 40 per cent.
Again, all the imprests for commissioners and political office holders were
reduced or removed completely.
One
day, Ladoja visited the Press
Centre at the Governor’s
Office and saw a staggering telephone bill. The governor simply cut off the
line and sent all the state correspondents away. Not only this, the governor restricted the NITEL lines of
many of the political office holders to Ibadan. Not even the Chief Media
Officer is spared, but he was generous enough to allow them receive calls from outside Ibadan. Again, during his early days in office,
NEPA came with a huge bill incurred by the state secretariat complex. The
governor simply told NEPA officials to cut off the power supply to the Agodi
Secretariat Complex. And for more than two weeks, the complex was without
electricity, but the governor encouraged diesel supply for the power generating
plant at the Governor’s Office, only that when the governor or the deputy
is not around, there will be no power supply for any other top official in the
Governor’s Office.
Now,
when does prudence become meanness? As defined above, this is when the action
of the prudent manager simply becomes “ungenerous, unwilling to share or
help, unkind, especially of unpleasant behaviour which others dislike”
while its sister word stingy, simply goes straight to the point, by describing
it as when the prudent manager is “having or showing unwillingness to
give, especially money”.
Going
by the above definition, which defines mean as “unpleasant behaviour
which others dislike” there is no doubt that even some members of
Ladoja’s cabinet dislike his policies and are complaining of not having
enough funds to carry out government programmes and inability to back up their positions
financially.
So,
what is the effect of this attitude? It is simply waning the popularity of the PDP
government in Oyo State. Even though
Lam Adesina’s
administration received less funds between 1999 and 2003, the monthly
allocation to Oyo State today stands close to N2 billion (N1.9 billion), about
double of what Adesina’s administration received during the period, yet there is nothing on the ground
right now to show for it after over one year.
However,
the governor was generous enough during his 60th birthday celebration so much
that the celebration lasted three days with six special programmes. But his
predecessor, Lam Adesina, has already taken him up on that, asking to declare
the amount spent on the elaborate birthday celebration, even as some of his
aides said the anniversary was financed from the governor’s private
purse.
Our focus here is not to undermine anybody but to lay bare
the facts, feelings, opinions of the people and the effects of
government’s policies on the people in a democratic governance and make
government accountable. It is for the people to decide if Ladoja is stingy or
not, after all, he has been told to his face either by jokes or by frank talks.
To change his attitude will do a lot of good to himself, the government and the
people.
|
