The Transition Implementation Committee (TIC) Chairman, Isin Local Government Area of Kwara State, Hon. Tunde Fadipe has described the Executive Governor of Kwara State, Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq’s disposition to public issues as unprecedented and best.
Fadipe, in this interview with our editor, Mike Adeyemi, said the administrative system of the Governor is foreign, affirming that Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq has allowed the local government to operate at its pace without hindrance.
According to him, “there is no controversy on the fact that AbdulRazaq is the best to happen to Kwara. His disposition to public issues is encouraging and unprecedented. He allows the local government to run. I can tell you the fact that there is no local government that is not performing in Kwara.”
The TIC Chairman however attributed all his achievements at the Council to the chances given to him by the Governor, saying his administration had got rid of all the rots he inherited. Excerpts;
Tell us about your early life?
My both parents are late, they are teachers. So I grew up in an educated environment. I told my children last week that I was opportuned to attend primary schools where my parents were the heads of those schools.
That actually informed my decision to think of becoming a community leader while growing up.
I must say that I inherited politics from my father. I have known my father to be a politician. My father’s name was chief Samson Abiodun Fadipe. He was the Ajapona of Oke-Onigbin. The title means, he is the head of the military chiefs of my community.
So,it is like growing up under a very strict parental tutelage and that informed me to grow to become whom I am today.
Where and how did you receive the news of your appointment as TIC Chairman, Isin Local Government?
This question has some nostalgic perceptions with mixed feelings. I came from Lagos in 2018, precisely April when my mum was becoming weak and so ageing that she could not actually cope with the rigour of life. I decided to quit what I was doing in Lagos to join her in Ilorin.
We were both living together. In December, 2020, she had a domestic accident where she fell and she was hospitalized. The day I became the Local Government chairman, I was actually with her in the hospital, and few days later she passed on.
I know I signified interest, but the onus is of the Excellency to decide from the pool of his men and boys, so I was expectant, but it was not cleared. someone called me that he went to get his letter, I mean the chairman of Oke-Ero in company of Bode Towoju.
Towoju was former commissioner for information, later he was in sports. He called me, saying Tunde, go and get your latter. I said from where? He said from the Ministry of Local Government. I was with my mum in the hospital at the time. I had to tell the Nurses that I would be away for thirty minutes and be back.
When I got to the Ministry of Local Government, I went straight to the office of the Permanent Secretary and he said “we didn’t call you, how do you know that your name is here.” I told him that somebody just left your office now and the Perm Sec said let me check if your name is actually there. In the process, he checked and looked up to say Mr. Chairman, please have your seat. That was how I knew.
On what merit would you say the Governor based your appointment?
I must sincerely thank him. I would not say I am the most qualified as at that time, but I knew am qualified. I didn’t know other things that might happen behind the scene, but I knew that quite a number of people wanted me to be there, and that, was based on my relationship with people, my level of education and my exposure.
Really I had not been at the back seat as far as Kwara politics is concerned, so Tunde Fadipe was not like unknown face. But the way it played out was that, I was not the most qualified and I am not saying am one of the few that qualified. Every member of the party that actually played a role toward the election actually qualified.
I just believed that the Governor decided to choose me based on his own personal feelings that I would excel and he was justified at the end of the day. I mean his decision was justified,because it was like he placed much beliefs in my personality which I feel I should not betray him.
What are the tasks you met in the Council when you assumed office?
This is really a big question. We inherited a council that had a very different ideological perspective in terms of governance and administration. Judging from the fact that the definition of local government from the past administration was different from our focus of new local government.
Local Government of the old government used to be a pot by which everybody deepened their hands and took whatever they felt belonged to them. So one of the challenges we faced was that they believed such system should continue. The major problem with Nigeria is that once we stick to a system, nobody would want anybody to change it.
In fact, some of my party members also believed it was their turn to share the booties of the Local Government. So we faced that challenges and it was a very big issue because the chairman would now be at the centre of abuse and propaganda because they felt the running cost should be shared among some people including the staff.
That aside, we also met the Local Government that was down. Nobody was coming to work, the infrastructure at the Council was near zero. You got to offices, there was no chairs, no tables, nobody was reporting to the office. So it was unpalatable issue and that was where we started our administration.
We started with reorientation of what the Local Government really means. I met a very shattered, bad Isin Local Government. Both in terms of ideology and structure. We had to endure propaganda even from our kinsmen. From day one, it has been very tough.
We had to navigate so many political structure. We had to talk with many people, we had to fight. It affected a lot of things, but I think three years down the line, we had moved and whoever that would be inheriting the Council will meet a near perfect system.
Invariably, you stepped on toes in the course of rejigging Isin LG?
Of course, we stepped on so many toes. Although we have become friends again, because, ‘one of the means to be successful in politics is to remain resolute in your perspective. If you shake, you are gone.’
So once you believe, stay with it. Propaganda would come, people would attack you, people would say this is the way we have been doing it before. I asked them what was the result from how you had been doing it?
If you had been sharing public fund before, that is why you cannot show any tangible structure by the past administration before now. No record! So it is a complete system that we had to change all over. But we are all friends now and enjoying each others.
What have you been doing to improve the Council Internally Generated Revenue (IGR)?
I described Isin as a land luck country. Land luck country means when a country is bounded by other countries with no accessibility to water, to any other means. If you look at the Geographical representation of Isin, we are bounded by Ifelodun which is an established local government. We also bounded by another well established local government, Irepodun.
How do we move. The proximity between Oke-Onigbin, the chief town of Isin, to Oro is almost the same to Owu. People still believe in doing business in the territory of those local governments. So we identified agriculture as one of our mainstay and we have been having series of impact to make sure that our farmers remain better and improve on the past development.
We have established the first Isin Agricultural Produce Market at Oke-Oyi junction. We provided them with water, land and other basic needs for it take-off. We inherited 17 Primary Health Centres, and we have almost 26 now.
These are the ways we can increase our bed spaces that will be accessible for medical facilities, as well to get some returns from these hospitals, though not a commercial purpose , but one of the way we can generate income.
Then we have shops at Mandate Market. We have restructured it to make it better for suitable people to take and give us returns. We have also built the Seyi Edunfunke Shopping Complex in Oke-Onigbin. That is like 18 shops and we make sure that we maintain all those units.
Now, we have centralized our administrative responsibility of indigenship certificate, chairman’s attestation. All these areas are bringing more revenue. But our pivotal focus is to make sure that our farmers improve, ones they improve they have where to sell the produce within our community.
I think that is why we had to hold Business Tech Summit, to sanitize our people on how to run business. I told you that 30 certificates of registration is in process and we are still going. We have over 100 people that attended the Summit and by the Grace of God we are going to sort out everyone of them within a month.
Tell us some of your achievements since you assumed office?
Let’s come from soft to the hard. I mean let us come from the angle of human capital development. Now, we have two indigent students running a program of Aircraft Scheduling and Administration in Kwara State College of Aviation, sponsored entirely by this local government. We presented them for interview, we encouraged them to apply and we took over.
We have also sent over 40 indigent people to IVTECH, Ajase Ipo to learn different types of trade. We identified two young potential footballers, we picked them up and they are already doing well at the Kwara State Football Academy. One of them is adjudged to be the best in his age group. He is the most valuable players in the last competition.
Like I said, we hold the Business Tech Summit to encourage people. We have invested in education, we provided teaching aid to teachers at the Grassroots. The only community based functioning Technical College in Kwara State is at Pamo – Isin.
When we came on board, the school wrote to us that the school is a community efforts and they had not been able to write WAEC because they didn’t have a library. We built a library facility for them. We renovated five Primary Health Centres and we equipped the 17 Primary Health Centres when we came onboard.
The Primary Health Centre, Oke-Onigbin was meant to be the best when we took over, but there was no water there. The structure was down, we renovated it. The worsening part was that they were using lantern to take delivery. We bought a generator for them, built quarters attached to the hospital, we renovated the hospital and we brought in new staff.
We have sunk 11 boreholes all across within three years and we repaired 18. The entire council Secretariat was leaking when we took over. The only office that was not leaking was the Chairman’s office. We renovated the entire Secretariat and we provided a very good environment for staffer to have a space to deliver their services.
The Secretariat Hall was entirely renovated. We opened the roof and we adjusted the structure. We have built quarters, two flats each. We provided solar light to all the 11 wards of the local government. We built Primary Health Care Centre at Adigun – Imonle, we built another PHC at Eti-Oje. We identified six of our PHC centres and equipped them with oxygen in case they have emergency.
We built toilets at the Secretariat. Before its was open deification at the Council. We built 12 units of toilets at the Secretariat. We built car parks. When we came in, all the Local Government’s vehicles were grounded, but as I am talking to you all the Local Government vehicles are working. I bought two security vans and one ambulance. We are working on Mechanic Village in Ijara-Isin.
We have graded all Isin roads twice and our achievement in security is unmatched anywhere. We procured six motorbikes for vigilantes and later we added another 10. We procured CuG system for our vigilantes.
How were you able to curb truancy among the workers of the LG?
It is in two ways. You use the punitive method or carrot and stick. If you provide carrot, that means you are encouraging them. You are giving them concession, but it is only when they fail to grap the opportunity that you now use stick. We take our attendance very much.
We make reports to Ministry of Local Government on anyone culpable. I encourage Local Government Service Commission to come to our local government often , and this is because as the head of the local government, you can only provide leadership. The buck of punitive lies in the commission that actually employed them.
I equally find synergy with NULGEL. That is the body of the Local Government that I report staff. NULGEL in Isin are working and staff too are discharging their duties diligently.
You have been adjudged one of the best TIC chairmen in Kwara. How do you feel?
Let us first thank His Excellency, Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq for giving us this opportunity to express our ideas. You may have all the ideas of the world and there is a chain that is holding you not to be expressive, there is nothing you could do.
We also need to be appreciative to the Governor once again because he allows the Local Government run. I am not talking about my achievements alone. I can tell you to a fact that there is no local government in Kwara that is not performing. All Kwara Local Government are doing well.
I came second behind Sulu Gambari at Primary Health award mainly because the governor has invested in PHC at the Local Government level. This tells you that the Governor allows the LGs to run because you cannot pick the best if there is no system that is working.
If we say somebody is the best, this is because there is a competition. The Local Government fund is for the Local Government. In fact, I know like two or three instances where the allocation of the Local Government was not enough, the Governor had to borrow us money to pay. Now the Local Government monies is for them and that is why we could buy two vans for security. Each local government has an ambulance.
So, there is no primary health department of local government without an ambulance in Kwara. They are so equipped and the best. We need to thank the Governor for allowing local government to function. If you see any local government performing in Kwara, the gory is to the God Almighty and the Governor that allows the LGs to function.
Some people have said that, Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq is the best to happen to Kwara, while the opposition party says the contrary. How best would you describe the Governor?
There is no controversy in the statement of fact that Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq is the best to happen to Kwara in history. His disposition to public issue is encouraging, unprecedented. This is a governor that you can be abusing in your own small knowledge and tomorrow you have a genuine idea and he is responding.
He has never responded to any propaganda on his own. He is moving. I would tell you how I got a letter of recommendation from him. I was in my office and somebody was calling me, I didn’t picked the call. Suddenly, somebody was backing on my door that the Governor is in my home town, without notice. I got to Oke-Onigbin before I discovered that he actually came to see Kabiyesi. We had to join him and he moved to our water works.
Along the way, he just asked me ,can you lead me to your office? That was how he came to my office. I was down folded because this was a governor sitting down with me unprepared. What we had to do is to show him what we had done and he was encouraged. He was happy.
When he came to Ilorin, he wrote a letter of recommendation that we were doing well. The administrative system of Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq is foreign. He doesn’t need anybody to go and praise him. We have seen evidence of his performance in education, even in sports , health, landscape and infrastructure, in housing, in road development cetera.
You have a simple governor that you can pick your phone and call. This is a man that didn’t see himself as superior than the least kwarans. So how do we better define that person than to say he is the best so far. I am not saying this because I work for him, or am in the government. I have seen governance outside this state.
Mall. AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq is God’s sent and our prayer for him is to lead us to the promised land safely and wherever the successor is coming , the person should have the same mindset of people oriented project.
The Kwara LG elections is around the corner, are you running?
I belong to a particular family that has system and structure. If my people want me to run, I will run. If my people want another assignment for me, I will take it. But am a politician and this is what am doing. I think for any position in the state I am eminently qualified to run and I will be looking forward. Let’s wait for what will come out.
You got the letter of recommendation from the Governor, what would you say informed this?
Getting a recommendation letter from the Governor is an encouragement and at the same time placing a big responsibility on my neck. That has reposed much confidence in me and I should not betray him.
What makes me get letter of recommendation is that we stick to doing the right thing. Even till tomorrow, we will continue to do the right thing. The letter of recommendation came before Ministry of Local Government came out with the award.
The Ministry of Local Government assessed us based on what we are doing and compliance with the rules. That is, if you want to do projects, do you follow due process? So there is no magic.
The Tanke flying over has been rubbished mostly by the opposition,saying it was poorly done. As an Engineer, is it true that the bridge fails COREN test?
The only tribute that a failure can pay to success is criticism. If you see the opposition talking like that, what would they say? They had the opportunity of governing this state for close to 24 years, they have no achievements. So you cannot expect that they will fold hands, they must keep themselves busy.
The NLC has said where is the COREN statement that faulted the project. Is COREN and the NLC masquerades that do not have a website or that do not have people that would come out and talk on issues?
What do you expect when the opposition themselves have turned to regulatory body. Let then continue to mess themselves.