Edo State is more than ever becoming a cynosure of not only all who have eyes for enduring development, but also for organisation and institutions concerned with the business of human and infrastructural development anywhere it is genuinely taking place. The reality of this was evident in the recent visit of the officials of the Bank of Industry (BOI) to Edo State governor, Godwin Obaseki.
The bank’s Managing Director, Kayode Pitan, cut to the chase when he said that their bank sees in Edo State government, a dependable partner and as such remains committed to working with it to complement its development efforts. He noted specifically that the bank was ready to support the medium and small-scale enterprises in the state and other major companies. “We are putting together a package to raise substantial funding from N500 billion to one trillion naira for us to move forward what government is doing,” he revealed.
BoI’s partnership with the state, Mr. Pitan observed, has been on for some years. The renewal of the corporation, as he explained, was predicated on the need to expand the frontiers of development. Said he: “Part of the reason for coming is for us to show we can move this partnership to a higher level. We want to see how we can expand the scope of what we are doing… to know the areas of emphasis of the administration and how we can partner with the state to help industrialists, the market women, people who have small businesses and how to work to move the state forward.”
That request of BoI to know the priority areas of development was all Governor Obaseki needed to fire on all cylinders.
On the outline of what stands Edo State out as a viable investment destination, he said: “Edo State is so strategically located within the context of Nigeria and that’s why it’s called ‘the Heart Beat’. With a landmass of approximately 20 million square kilometres, over 70 per cent of it is arable. We have swamp, rain forest and Savannah. So, in reality, there is no crop that we cannot sustain in Edo State in addition to our water bodies. We have about 263 mining licences which span a whole variety of solid minerals. We have approximately 4.2 million people with an annual growth rate of three per cent, which is typical of Nigeria.”
He spelt out to his visitors that, “in terms of GDP” rating among the states, Edo is about “the sixth and our goal is to push to be among the top three in the next four years. Our state capital, Benin City, is one of the top 10 cities in the country in terms of population and the one key advantage we have is that we are a nodal state and a logistic hub. Because of our location, you cannot go from the western part of Nigeria to the East or South-south without coming through Edo State. There is also an access to the North. From our logistic standpoint, we are right there as a node.”
As for infrastructure, the governor also stated that “Edo State is perhaps the only city that has the connectivity in terms of national road infrastructure. Other infrastructure like the electricity network and transmission network follow the same pattern. So, you have the lines transmitting power from generating plants from Delta into Benin and from here it’s distributed across the country. The gas network also follows the same trend. We have a gas hub, Oben. It’s the largest gas aggregation and distribution point in the country and it’s in Benin”.
Moreover, his administration, he explained, prioritises investment in infrastructure, “considering all the key advantages we have. For us as a government, our role is not to be involved in business. Our role is to create a suitable environment that enables businesses and industries to thrive. The other advantage we have is manpower, better than any other country in the world”. He added, “Our other core advantage is electricity, using gas to drive electricity. On the large end is Azura power plant, and it’s due for completion by March next year. So, between the first and second quarter of next year, we would have 900 megawatts power”.
No stone, Governor Obaseki to his visitors, would be left unturned in improving the fortunes of the state. He said that his administration was making meticulous efforts to maximise the use of the resources and opportunities available in the state. The big picture, he added, is to transform Edo into a really “modern and progressive state where every citizen is empowered with the opportunity to live life to its fullest”.
The governor equally spoke on the critical role of institution reforms to the development he and his team are working towards. He contended that without it, no development would endure. For him, economic prosperity, the type that will bring vast change to the state, would only be feasible if institutional reforms are concretised.
He told his guests that education constitutes the bedrock of the development he is carefully working out for the people of the state: “It is the key,” he stressed, “to the development we are seeking to achieve”, noting further that “basic education is the foundation on which every development will rest and it is one area we are emphasising without apologies. If you do not fix the basic education system at the public level, whatever we are doing will not work. We are launching the teachers’ training programme immediately schools go on vacation this summer. We can talk about industrialisation and all the things we want to do, but if you are not training the children to be engineers, to have the tools to engage, then we will be wasting money.”
As anyone knows, the present administration in Edo pays premium attention to agriculture as a driver of economic growth and prosperity. It is one initiative that Obaseki took off with after his swearing-in in November last year. He told the BoI top brass: “Our goal is to work with large farmers who understand what to do, who have the capacity to invest and will now support the smaller farmers. In the area of agriculture, we ran a series of lectures and we have come to the conclusion that what we need to do is help de-risk part of the agricultural chain. And today, we have about 3000 hectares for maze farmers this season. Cassava is our goldmine. In rubber production, we are the largest rubber producing state. We intend to continue to grow that by making more land available for it.”
One other area the Edo State Government is looking to modernise the state involves issue of water. In a recent visit he paid to the water installation facility in the state, the governor said he was shaken by what he saw. The summary of what he was confronted with at that facility is that he was challenged to see to it that something meaningful is done to revamp that sector. To this end, he said state government was ready to work with any willing investor in that area. With “the right investment,” he reasoned, “we will be able to supply pipe-borne water” across the state.
Housing matter was not excluded in the governor’s discussion with his callers. He told them, “Because of our location, we have been inundated with proposals. We have done flyover Benin City and we are flying over the state. So we have enough special data to do planning and other things investors need and require to make decisions.”
Similarly, he talked about the renewed interest his administration is according the tourism sector. Being itself a money spinner wherever it is taken seriously, the Edo government is poised to generate good money from that sector, hence the attention being given to it. To make sure that nothing upset the plan, the governor disclosed that security in and around the state was being more seriously engaged. For, as he argued, tourism cannot flourish in an insecure orbit.
Being so committed to upping the ante of all-inclusive development, the governor revealed that a renewed relationship, one that would be “radically different from what has been”, with the BoI was inevitable. “We want to be smarter in managing the limited resources we have,” he emphasised. It is for this reason that the government is teaming up with institutions like BoI and other similar ones. The partnership, squarely, is for the progress of Edo State.
- Mayaki is Chief Press Secretary to Edo State governor.
