Why Oyetola Will Win 2022 Election -By Adebayo Adedeji

If teachers, road transport workers, NLC, TUC, babalojas, iyalojas, Christian priests, Imams, and organised indigenous religion practitioners endorse you for re-election, you do not need to ache your head further, for God has really answered your prayer. You only need to vocalise your Amens to claim it. This should be the case for the incumbent governor of Osun State, Gboyega Oyetola, whose re-election bid has become a project enlivened and promoted by all the movers and shakers in the state.The endorsements keep pouring in daily. The organised labour unions represented by the Nigeria Union of Teachers, Nigeria Labour Union, Trade Union Congress, Nigeria Union of Pensioners, etc, have, on different occasions, thrown their weight behind the 2nd Term ambition of the man many have described as not only a performing governor, but also a governor with human face.

The latest in the endorsement galore is that of the National Union of Road Transport Workers, NURTW. But as expected, the cynics and the rejected politicians are struggling terribly to foul-mouth the road transport workers’ open display of love for the Oyetola government. The invidious politicians who, in the years past, purchased premium slots in the newspapers and Television to broadcast a similar endorsement, are commissioning fiction mercenaries to downplay effects powerful endorsements, like that of the NURTW and other groups, would have on the gubernatorial campaign of Oyetola.

What is endorsement and what causal effect does it have on election?

Fernanda Leite Lopez, in “The Tuesday Advantage of Politicians Endorsed by American Newspapers” published in The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, describes an Endorsement as a formal way of signaling and mobilising group support for a candidate. It, he stresses, is a real commitment, rather than an empty statement, that promises concrete actions by groups and members. It is an essential part of campaigning as it can add credibility and validate a candidacy. It improves a candidate’s reach and encourages voter turnout for him. It gives positive optics to a campaign. It is on record that the May 2013 endorsement of Rauf Aregbesola by the NURTW improved his public rating and encouraged a battalion of opposition party leaders to join the All Progressives Congress ahead of the 2014 gubernatorial contest. Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Isiaka Adeleke, two former governors of the state and PDP chieftains, are ready examples of those who joined APC because the public perception was favourable to the ruling APC. Nobody wanted to be left behind in Siberia. Everyone wanted to identify with the winning team. The bandwagon effect: that is what an endorsement does.

The public, definitive and stated preference of Oyetola by influential unions like NLC, TUC, NUT, NURTW, will boost the governor’s chances in the next year’s election. There is a vast body of literature that shows a strong and positive relationship between votes and received endorsements, including Erickson (1976), Coombs (1981), Bullock (1984), Lieske (1989), and Krebs (1998).

In Osun State, two blocs determine votes: the Formal workers and Informal workers. The Formal workers are the government workers ( active workers and pensioners).

The Informal workers, in this context, are workers in the structured and unstructured private employments. They are the artisans, the road union workers. The Iyalojas, the babalojas. What shaped the opinion of the Formal bloc? Timely payment of their salary and pensions. What do the Informal workers want? Projects. Road projects. Empowerment programmes. Infrastructure that would ease stress of plying their trade. Chief Bisi Akande lost the Formal, but had the Informal. He lost his re-election in 2003 to Olagunsoye Oyinlola. Oyinlola seemingly had the Formal but lost the Informal, he again lost his re-election to Rauf Aregbesola, a pan-Osun candidate in 2007, even though Aregbesola was a debutant in Osun politics at the time. Aregbesola, in his first term, had the two blocs in 2014 and won his second term election convincingly, notwithstanding the federal resources deployed by the opposition PDP. Unfortunately, Aregbesola faltered along the way. He lost the Formal but had the informal. Aregbesola’s inability to sunstain an amitie with the workers, pensioners and their unions, made the 2018 election strenuous for his party’s candidate, Gboyega Oyetola. The governing party did not only lose bunch of his votes in its strongholds, it also lost in Ijeshaland, Aregbesola’s acclaimed place of origin.

The party was defeated in four of the six local governments in Ijeshaland to obtain 46,140 votes as against PDP’s 48,859 votes. In the same Ijeshaland in 2014, APC had cleared all the six LGs, obtaining 65,039 votes as opposed to PDP’s 36,488 votes. The 2018 election was a definite resentment to Aregbesola who, immediately after his re-election, chose to experiment with the welfare of the civil servants and pensioners by activating a modulated salary, otherwise known as half-salary. As at the period the 2018 election was conducted, the Aregbesola government was owing workers and pensioners close to 30 months of their entitlements! This impacted on the negative rating of APC.

But today, the story has changed. Oyetola has got both the Formal and Informal blocs. His performance is as profound as it is inspiring. In the last 35 months, over N150 billion has been released to settle pension and salary commitments. Regardless of the debt burden bequeathed to it by Aregbesola government, debt amounting to over N200 billion as at inauguration in November 2019, Oyetola government continues to steady the state to economic prosperity. Of the debt, the current government has offset about N70 billion of it. With the financial challenges occasioned by the heavy deductions, the state, since last November, has begun to implement the N30,000 Minimum Wage. The civil servants are happy. So also the pensioners.

As the government is amenable to the demands of the civil servants and pensioners, so it is closing the Infrastructure deficit. Moro-Yakoyo-Ipetumodu-Ife-Ibadan expressway, first constructed in 1976, has been rehabilitated. The project, described as the biggest construction project in the history of Ife-North Local Government, was done in a record time of nine (9) months, in line with the principle of the administration that completion time for all projects should not exceed 10 months. The 25km Ede-Ara-Ejigbo has been done. 13km Ada-Igbajo road has been done. The 4.1k Ilesha Roundabout-Sabo-Akure Expressway has been done. And according to Oluremi Omowaiye, the state’s Commissioner for Works, 10 roads, alongside the 0.64km Olaiya Flyover, would be ready for inauguration by end of the year. Again, in the coming weeks, contracts for reconstruction of six networks of roads in Ifeland would be awarded.

In equal breath, the government has constructed/rehabilitated primary health centres in nearly all the 332 political wards in the state. The contract for the last batch of 17 health centres has been awarded. This is in addition to the nearly completed 120-bed project in the State Specialist Hospital at Asubiaro, Osogbo.

The Osun Food Support Scheme, inaugurated in April of this year, is another social intervention programme of the Oyetola administration that is connecting it to the people of the state. The scheme, targeted at the most vulnerable citizens of the state, is aimed at improving the well-being of the beneficiaries. Since take-off of the scheme in April, 210,000 beneficiaries have been covered. And the government is not slowing down. The government, according to the Commissioner in charge of the project, Olalekan Badmus, is planning to increase its reach so more citizens can be serviced. Badmus similarly assured the citizens of the government’s commitment to sustain the project. He also indicated the government’s plan to initiate a monthly cash-support progamme for the senior citizens and widows in the state. The programme would be code-named “Itoju Agba, Itoju Opo.”

Oyetola’s exemplary leadership is reflected in every facet of governance in the state, including in the traditional institution and local government administration. He believes communal peace is much needed if the drive of his government to attract investors is to have any headway. It took the leadership of Oyetola to settle the 34-year-old obaship tussle in Ikire in March this year. Similarly in April this year, the Owaloko of Iloko-Ijesha tussle was resolved by Oyetola, 9 years after it was declared vacant at the transition of Oba Oladele Olashore in June 2012.

In the words of Prince Adebayo Adeleke (Banik), the Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs in the state, ” It took the God-given sagacity of Governor Oyetola to restore peace into the Apomu Kingdom, leading to the installation of Oba Kayode Afolabi. Governor Oyetola has also resolved the issue of Alara of Ara in Egbedore Local Government which began at the exit of Oba Sunmonu Omolaoye Ekundayo in February, 2010. The tussle sorrouding the Apetumodu of Ipetumodu stool of Ife North, which began in November 2017, has also been put to rest by this government. We have been able to create this harmonious relationship because the governor is deliberate about bringing a lasting peace in the state. He addresses issues without political bias and fixation.”

The achievements so far are what have endeared Oyetola to the people of the state. The acheivemnts are the reason for the floodgate of endorsements currently turning the stomach of the naysayers and detractors. The achievements in the last 35 months, no doubt, would speak glowingly for him in the next year’s gubernatorial election. Governor Oyetola has worked to deserve a 2nd Term in office. And by God’s grace and overwhelming support of the people of Osun State, he will get it. The trending endorsements — the public display of affection for his person and government — are just icing on the cake. No foul-mouthing can stop an idea whose time has come.