Elders react to political development in Kwara
The Kwara Elders Unity Forum has described the recent political development where Senate President Bukola Saraki and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) lost out in the Presidential and National Assembly Election as a welcome development.
The forum in separate interview with Daily Times, in Ilorin, the members stated that efforts to rescue the state from servitude of a family had been on for a long time.
Adebayo asserted that the people of the state were able to use the election to state their determination to free themselves of the personification and personal ownership being claimed by a family.
“As a result of the election we had, the people of Kwara have stated their determination to free themselves of the personification, personal ownership being claimed by a family of the whole of a state. We just put Saraki in his place in the context of Kwara and Nigeria as a whole. What we had been witnessing in the state in the time past was like a disaster; people have just done the right thing. They have made the point in a very clear term”, said the former governor.
He, however, warned the government of the All Progressives Congress (APC) when formed to learn a lesson from the fall of the PDP and Saraki in the state.
“They (New government) should watch those who have come before them and be servant of the people”, he said, urging people to vote for the APC in March Governorship and State Assembly election so as to complete the overhauling. Let’s not be servant of Saraki boy when we have rejected his master”, said the chairman of the elders forum.
Adebayo, who also commended the re-election of President Muhammadu Buhari, urged him to focus on education, empowerment, equitable pay for workers and restructuring for Nigeria among others.
Dr Saliu Ajia, who is the coordinator and the convener of the forum, expressed delight that the forum had not put the state to a shame.
According to him, Kwara has deviated for the path to growth and development due to the protracted years of bad leadership.
He, however, expressed optimism that the state would reclaim the lost glory now that people have loosened the grips of enslavement by a political dynasty belonging to a selfish family.
Ajia urged the people of the state to come out on March 9 to replicate the victory of the APC candidates at all levels and put a final end to the era of servitude and political enslavement in the state.
In his words, Sen. Idris Haliru said he was happy to congratulate the people of Kwara for making out their mind to have the kind of difficult change in state.
According to him, Kwara is a state, where people have been suffering for a very long time and those who are ruling in the state are very terrible and do not want to have any people around them except their people following them.
“We are tire of the situation because this is a democracy, where people need to be involved in whatever administration we come up with in the state, but we are not getting it many decades.
“I want to say that I congratulate the new government in Kwara in advance. It is our prayer and God has come to our aid by removing the devil and that one is gone.
“So we are now waiting for new people to come. The new people coming in should embrace everybody, bring everybody on board. They should allow peace to reign in Kwara and let everybody has a sense of belonging.
“What I will advise the government to focus on as an elder in the state is to have record of all that have been happening and the sufferings in Kwara state.
“To start with, the politicians that suffered along with them; nobody is taking care of anybody except few people who are close to them doing sycophancy; embracing the bad things they are doing to Kwara”, he said.
Haliru noted that the government in the state was never a government of the people, but that of a family.
He urged the new government to extend its activities to all nooks and crannies of Kwara to allow people to be involved in the governance of the state and give fair share to every side of the three senatorial districts in the state.
He advocated for local government autonomy where people at the grassroot would benefit from the dividends of democracy.
“Let every local government enjoy the benefit of democracy in governance in Kwara. Development is not forthcoming in the past 16 years. Money that is coming are been siphoned for personal thing and nothing has been done for Kwara state completely.
“So for that I will advise the government to focus on development of education, health, water resource, management of people socially and generally in the state.
“Let it be a participatory sort of government for everyone in the state. All benefits from the democratic norms in the state should go round”, he added.
Haliru, who is an elder from Kwara North, urged people to come out on March 9 to reject people who, he said had been enslaving Kwarans for everybody to enjoy the benefit of democracy.
Another elder, Otunba Adebayo Daramola said that the need to save the state from derailment informed the decision to convene the forum.
Daramola explained that members that saw Kwara under the first military regime observed that the state had been eroded of desired development.
“Immediately we sense that Kwara was derailing for quite sometimes, we started to think of how to go back to the path of honour. A few of us see the state with first ministry government. Some of us were young then, but what we thought we saw had eroded now.
“There are companies in the state. Kwara was producing Eagle rice, an equivalent to the popular Uncle Benz we all know and the factory was in Patigi. These are all gone. No nation has pride in importing foods and Kwara was producing grind rice, dressed chicken for companies in Lagos. We have lost all these among many others; Kwara established Trade Bank and now it has been destroyed”, he said.
He stated that the state had suffered from bad political leadership under Saraki.
“Kwara is one of the first generation states, look at our position today. In term of development in the last 16 years, it is so bad. It’s not an equivalent with our expectations. Osun is also having very small allocation, Ekiti is very different, yet you see the difference”, he said.
He explained that the battle to dislodge the political structure of Saraki had been on for 16 years, saying that the Kwara South regretted voting the incumbent governor, Abdulfatah Ahmed for his underperformance.
He, however, noted that the elder would have a lot of thing to do to put back the state on the path of progress.
“The elders have a lot of things to do; to put these groups that fought the war together to form a formidable team. I expect the incoming government to itemise things that had been lacking and work on it. The expectation is very high. It should be able to lay a foundation within a first 100 days, and then it builds the trust in government. They have a lot of things to do to put a good team together, once they do that”, he said.
He urged the incoming government in the state to focus on prompt salary payment, creation of small scale industries and rural development.
