Ekiti State Governor Biodun Oyebanji spoke with reporters in Ado-Ekiti, the state capital, on his victory during the recent consensus primary and plans for raising the bar of good governance. Deputy Editor EMMANUEL OLADESU reports
This is the first time we will have a consensus arrangement in APC where all the tendencies within the party are saying it has to be you. How did you achieve this?
What happened today is historic. In the history of this state, we are 29 years old as a State, and no democratically elected government has been able to pull this kind of feat. There has been no time that a government succeeds itself. So, by God’s grace, if we win next year June, we’ll be the first government that will run back to back. We have had governors that have spent two terms, but usually they will lose an election, leave and then return back to office. And that has been the bane of our development, because there is always policy truncation, you know, when a government comes, it abandons the project and policies of the former. It will start its own, and it will spend four years, it will go, another government will come. When we were fighting for this state, by providence, I was the secretary of the committee for the creation of Ekiti State, I was a very young man then, I was 26 years than, I worked with the founding fathers of the State and I sat at meetings with them, I know their desire for Ekiti. I know the visions of the founding fathers of this state and there’s no politician in Ekiti State today that has the kind of experience I’ve had in public service.
Before I became governor, I’ve put eleven years into public service. I started as a Senior Special Assistant, I later became a Special Adviser, and later became the Chief of Staff, to Governor Niyi Adebayo. We left in 2003. And then Dr Kayode Fayemi came in 2010. So, there was seven years hiatus. We came back in 2010, and I worked with Dr Fayemi for four years. I served in three different capacities- Commissioner for Integration and Intergovernmental Affairs; Head, Office of Strategy and Service Delivery, and Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning. The Government lost re-election in 2014. In 2018, Dr Fayemi came back and I was appointed Secretary to the State Government, So, I have seen governance at very close range and those two appointments as Chief of Staff and SSG made me to work very closely with the two governors.
I’ve seen them taking decisions and facing the consequences. So, I cannot claim not to have the experience when it comes to governance. I told myself when I got to this seat, that look, all these mistakes they’ve made, I have to avoid them. It was intentional on my part. I also discovered that the former governors don’t have good relationship with one another. When Governor Segun Oni was governor, we had a meeting in Ilupeju, and I told him Your Excellency, why don’t you do something like the Council of State, like an association or a forum of former governors to meet quarterly, he said he would do it, he didn’t do it. I’m going to do it in my second term. We are going to send a bill to the House of Assembly that will make it mandatory for any governor to have such a meeting once in a quarter.
So, when I became governor, I made up my mind to be at peace with everyone. Governor Fayose did something that shocked me, his party contested against our party, the day I won, he called the candidate of his party to congratulate me and he should also write a letter of congratulation and he should not go to court. He did that. This same Kayode Ojo took me to court on pre- election matters, it ran to the Supreme Court. Engr Segun Oni took me to the court, it ran to the Supreme Court. For two years, I was in and out of court. So, if Fayose had added his own to it, I would have had three cases. At a point, I had 35 court cases. So, I went to him and said, why did you do this?
He said look, I am now matured and now I can rise beyond politics and be a statesman, you deserve every support that you can get. Some may ask how do I relate with well with all the former governors. I just respect them. If they want to see me, I go to their houses. I don’t allow them to come to my office. I call them, I check on them. If they have social functions, I go there, that is all. But people assume that maybe I’m giving them money. No. it’s not like that. Even if you give money and you don’t respect them, you know, they will just take the money and they will not support you. But it has got to a point now where I can pick my phone and call Governor Fayose or call the wife, it’s that kind of relationship I have with them and I also have relationship with their children. So, we are members of the same family, and the people are happy for that, we are able to plan our life, people are able to sleep with their two eyes closed, there is no tension in town, there’s no violence, you know and everybody is happy, and the State is better for it. So, it is just mutual respect and understanding.
There’s been clamouring in recent times for reserved seats for women generally in politics and knowing that women are very crucial in governance, whether national or sub-national, what are your plans for women ahead of 2027?
If you look at our record, we are one of the best in the country when it comes to gender equality and affirmative action. We have the highest number of female in the House of Assembly in the country today. My deputy is a woman, my Head of Service is a woman, the SSG is a woman, Accountant General is a woman, and Accountant General for local government is a woman. We have so many women serving as councilors, vice chairmen and chairmen of local government councils. So, maybe you have one or two states that could beat our record, so that is the tradition I met on ground because my predecessor’s wife, Erelu Bisi Fayemi is a gender activist, so we have a strong structure to protect the rights of women. But it should go beyond political appointments and elective offices, there are also spaces for those of them in the informal sector to ensure that we provide resources for them to support their businesses, and to support their trade so in every area, in every department of government there’s a desk for affirmative action. But for the reserved seats you know that depends on the National Assembly. If I am going to tell you the truth it’s going to be a bit tough., but we must have to keep the conversation ongoing.
Your Excellency, we have gone around and we have seen your efforts in terms of road infrastructure and health. But one area that Ekiti states is known for is agriculture. So, what are you doing to leverage on both the weather and the landmass, especially to help our youths, the citizens, and the economy of the state?
When I asked whether you have gone outside the town, I wanted to know whether you have visited our agric belt. You know, agriculture is one area that we have invested so much resources and Mr. President has been supportive. In the last one year, we have been able to pull from the streets to the farm 5,000 youths across 13 clusters in the State. We clear land for them, we give them improved seedlings, we do tractorization, we do land preparation, land development and we also set up an aggregation company to buy from them. We have now scaled it up to also building what we called the Renewed Hope Farm Dormitories. If you go to Ikere, I don’t know why you didn’t get to one of them, the dormitory is built as hostels for male and female, security house, they have a kitchen, they have a common room, there is internet, there is DSTV for their comfort. You can decide to stay on the farm for three to five days and you will not miss anything in the city.
We provide buses and provide security for all the clusters, we are doing this in partnership with the local government. It’s something I’m so proud of, because there’s no kind of formal employment that you can pull 5,000 people off the streets at once. The Governor of Edo State, His Excellency, Monday Okpebholo will be here to commission a road project and one of the dormitories on Wednesday.
We have done six dormitories across six clusters in the State. Our intention is to scale it up to 16 because we have 16 local governments areas because the challenge they are having presently is having to commute to the farm everyday which is not good for them, but now they can sleep over. They are making so much money and they are happy, and I am so excited.
You mentioned former governors and I know Ekiti has produced a lot of strong political figures. How do you navigate the influence of political godfathers while maintaining autonomy in governance?
To your first question on godfatherism, I think I have been lucky a bit with that because in Ekiti State we don’t have a history of a predecessor lording it over his successor. We don’t have that history, and do you know why, because we never had continuity.
How do you talk to a man who doesn’t belong to your political party?
The closest we’ve had was Governor Niyi Adebayo and Governor Kayode Fayemi, not because they succeeded each other, but because Otunba Adebayo brought Dr Fayemi to Ekiti, but Governor Adebayo left government in 2003 and Governor Fayemi did not come until 2010. So, it was actually Governor Segun Oni that left before Governor Fayemi came in. Immediately Fayemi became governor, Adebayo left the State. I was in that government, he did not come back, in fact at a point, people were insinuating they were quarreling and when I asked him, he said, look, I have given you someone that can be Governor, so why should I disturb him. Let him run his government, and when he came back, the same thing happened. I worked with Governor Fayemi as Secretary to the State Government, in fairness to him, when it comes to policy options and everything, he doesn’t disturb me at all, except I call him and I ask him for his advice. So, we don’t have that, and when he asked me to come and run, he did not give me any condition.
He didn’t say you have to do this for me, he doesn’t disturb me at all, you know, yes, there may be political interests, people going to him to ask him to talk to me for appointments, but those are things you can manage, but with respect to a predecessor lording it on his successor, we don’t have that problem and I was telling Edo and Kogi Governors yesterday that once I leave as a governor, I will just allow the Governor to run his show. Having faced this troubles for eight years, one should go and rest.
This state is known as the slogan, the Fountain of knowledge. How are you ensuring that public education matches this reputation in terms of quality and outcomes?
Coming to education, our strategy in education just like you said, we pride ourselves as one of the most educated states in the country, we have the highest PhD per capita in the country. There’s no household in the state that doesn’t have a PhD holder, but are we still that strong? No. And for us to the reverse the trend, we made up our mind that we need to strike a balance between what you teach, how you teach, and where you teach. I believe that those three issues will be extremely critical to the future of education. What you teach refers to the currency of the curriculum. How current, how relevant are your curriculum. How you teach refers to methodologies of teaching, the conditions of the teachers and other staff, are they happy with their welfare. Where you teach refers to the environment itself, is it inviting and conducive. So, our policy in education is to address all those gaps and we are doing that at the primary school level now through UBEC, but we don’t have that structure for our secondary schools and one area that by God’s grace that we are going to put attention on in the second term is secondary school education, because I’m not happy with the state of our secondary schools, there’s no structure at all to renovate them, we concentrate on primary schools, and secondary education is so critical. You cannot have a good primary schools and a bad secondary school. Once we strike a balance between the three issues of content, welfare and environment, the outcomes will be okay.the outcomes will be okay.
Are you jittery that the opposition party might truncate your second tenure aspiration?
Politicians are incurable optimistic, but I’m not. People will say that Ekiti is a one-party state, yes, but like you said, we have opposition, but we are waiting to know their candidates, then we will know the strategy to deploy. They don’t have a candidate yet, you know, but we will work until the election is won, because the election has implications for the 2027 presidential election. So, once their candidate emerges, then we will craft the appropriate strategy to deal with that. But are we jittery? No. But we won’t be complacent and also, we will not assume that it is Eldorado. We will work till the last minute.
At the end of your tenure, where do you expect Ekiti to be?
Well, we have a 30-year development plan that is the offshoot of our campaign manifesto, so the development plan stipulates where we should be at the end of every year. By 2030, by the grace of God, we envision a state that will be economically prosperous, a state that will have industries, a state where people will be able to live, to work, and to invest. A state that is secure, and a state where the indigenes will be proud that they have an entity they can call their own. So, our benchmark is the development plan, and every year we benchmark ourselves with that development plan, but we also have to review it now.
