Aregbesola: Visionary leader in troubled times -By Tola Adeniyi

Osun State Governor, Rauf Aregbesola

The Premier of the then Western Region of Nigeria, the Honourable Chief Obafemi Awolowo, hugely popular, was in 1954 set to introduce free and compulsory primary education throughout the region and needed money to finance the social welfare project. He had earlier on January 7, 1952 launched the welfarist and progressive government that kick-started the second stage of Yoruba civilisation with the attendant prosperity and development of Yorubaland in all facets.

Detractors of Awolowo and of his government mounted vitriolic campaigns against his welfare package and had brainwashed the people that should Awolowo be allowed to make education available free-of-charge to all and sundry, there would no longer be labourers and servants; farmers would lose their children who hitherto were the unpaid hands on the farms to the schools and a heavy tax burden would be inevitable for the people to bear.

On a sunny Saturday, January 9, 1954, the then sleepy town of Ago-Iwoye erupted in unprecedented riots. The town’s hitherto beloved monarch, Oba David Meloniti Osiyemi, had to flee the burning palace and trekked through the bush to Imodi in an escape route to Ijebu-Ode. He was an Awo ally. He cheated a certain death by the whiskers to escape detractors of the late Awolowo who were opposed to the regime’s policies.

Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola arrived to the world three years later on May 25, 1957. Right from childhood, he imbibed an inquisitive mind, a can-do spirit and an unusual humanist flare. He grew up with the conviction to be “his brother’s keeper”. Kind hearted and caring, he abhorred injustice and the man-made human suffering and deprivation. He was a mere two-year old boy in 1959 when the immortal Awo completed his mission in the West. Aregebsola did not know the Awo of pre-1959, but the spirit of Awo lived in him.

“If ever I had the opportunity to lead, I will serve humanity with all my strength, vigour and absolute transparency. I will inculcate the dictum of ‘Mind is the Master of Man’ and make education and acquisition of knowledge the corner stone of my covenant with people I lead and serve” was the common saying attributed to Aregebsola, an extremely studious and voracious reader, while going through high school and tertiary institutions.

At the Ibadan Polytechnic, Dr. Gbolade Osinowo then a lecturer and later a senior aide to the late Governor Olabisi Onabanjo of Ogun State and recently to President Olusegun Obasanjo, remembered young Aregbesola as a most formidable debater, a great student leader, a visionary and an unusual science student who was more concerned with liberal humanism and people’s struggles.

“I knew he would go high in life”, Osinowo testified.

It was this kind of background that prepared Aregebsola, widely acknowledged as an exceptional grassroots campaigner and mobiliser, for the daunting task of turning a hitherto civil service cum agrarian state into a vibrant, competitive and technology driven modern State of Osun.

Journey to the top of the ladder was not easy or smooth, though he got his political, administrative and managerial teeth sharpened by an unbroken eight-year tenure as Commissioner of Works and Infrastructure in Africa’s most prosperous and active state of Lagos with a population of 24 million restive cosmopolitan beings. Aregebsola was reputed to have worked exceptionally hard and prepared himself for governance. He later underwent three and half years of gruelling legal and political battles to regain his mandate as Governor of Osun State in November 2010.

Quickly, he settled down to serious work and within the first three years of the administration, his vision and mission had produced a catalogue of impressive landmarks. Some of these imperishable legacies include:

• Feeding more than 353,000 elementary school pupils nutritional meals daily through a revamped ground-breaking homegrown feeding and health programme, the O-MEALS.
• Provision of more than a million uniforms for all public school students.
• Reconstruction and upgrade of all dilapidated schools in the state into new state-of-art educational facilities.
• Empowerment of 5000 micro-entrepreneurs through the O-MEALS programme as caterers for the elementary schools.
• Raising primary school enrolment from 155,318 to 353,000, an increase higher than 80 per cent, with the introduction of the O-MEALS programme.
• Provision of 45 Omoluabi Scholar Buses for easy transportation of students.
• Increase of the primary school running grants from N7.4m to N424m per year.
• Increasing the secondary school running grants from N117m to more than N427m a year.
• Introduction of the E-Learning Tablet (Opon Imo-Tablet of Knowledge) for students in SSS-1 to SSS-3. The digital device described by UNESCO as “first of its type in the world”. It runs on Android 4.0 Platform with 512MB RAM and internal storage capacity of 32GB. It has three learning environments, including E-Virtual Classroom and Integrated Test Zone.
• Establishment of mega high schools with 3000-student capacity. The schools are equipped with ultra-modern high-tech facilities and state-of-the-art sporting/recreation facilities and 3000-sitting capacity halls.

All these were in keeping with his vision of a greater tomorrow for his people through liberalisation of education.

Radical innovations were geared towards employment generation. 5000 youths were trained in specialist ICT programmes; 31 other youths were trained in mechatronics in a train-the-trainer scheme while 40,000 boots were produced by the Osun Footwear and Leather Workers Union for Osun Youth Empowerment Scheme, the O-YES cadets with N100 million invested to revive moribund shoe factories in the state.  The more than 80,000 uniforms of O-YES cadets were produced locally in the state by members the Osun tailor unions.

The success of O-YES has made it a reference point in youth empowerment. The World Bank adopted the O-YES initiative as a model for its Youth Empowerment and Social Support Operation and the concept is being replicated in 18 other states.

Farmers in the state, 3,645 of them, benefitted from N476, 350,000 Government Guaranteed Agriculture Loan Scheme. Not fewer than 5000 new farmer cooperative groups were registered in the state between December 2010 and June 2014 and a 78-hectre cattle hub with a capacity for 10,000 cattle was established at Oloba in Iwo .

While meeting the objectives of food security, employment and wealth creation, the listed schemes including fish farms, piggery and ram fattening have also served as reliable sources of fish, poultry, beef, etc. supplies for the Osun Home Grown School Feeding and Health Programme.

Another radical visionary initiative was the Training for Youth in Agriculture. 3,806 O-YES cadets have been trained in modern agriculture at the O-REAP Youth Academy , Odua Farmers Academy and the Leventis Foundation.

Rural electrification projects were implemented in 38 rural communities alongside several bridges to ease transportation across the rural areas of the state.

Huge investments also went into culture and tourism development. Large scale rehabilitation, rejuvenation and refurbishments of about a hundred tourism icons which include the legendary Oranmiyan Staff at Ile-Ife, the Olumirin Erin Ijesha Waterfall, the Osun Osogbo groves as well as promotion of cultural festivals such as the Olojo Festival, Iwude Ijesa Festival, Obokun Festival and Odun Ade Festival.