‘Aregbesola is empowering the people’

Governor Aregbesola

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun State has urged residents to ignore the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP’s) allegation that Governor Rauf Aregbesola is not empowering the people.

In a statement by its Publicity Director Kunle Oyatomi, APC said: “What they actually mean is that Aregbesola did not give them fraudulent access to public funds for their private use as the PDP did for over seven years between 2003 and 2007.

“Since the state was created, no governor has done as much as Aregbesola to empower citizens legitimately. People in their thousands now engage in business profitably. This has resulted in increased banking activities, which was acknowledged by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) manager in Osun State.

“When the question of empowerment is raised in Nigeria today, Aregbesola occupies a prime position as apace setter, whose empowerment programmes are being replicated across the country. Within his first 100 days in office, Aregbesola created jobs for 20,000 youths. Today, that number has risen to 40,000 and over N400 million is being injected into the Osun State economy monthly. That comes to N4.8 billion yearly.

“He feeds primary 1-4 pupils in public schools, which costs N3.6 billion yearly. This involves the purchase of agricultural products from farmers and other residents. In fact, some Osun farmers have had to source products from neighboring state to meet the demand.

“One thousand six hundred senior citizens receive N1.6 billion monthly. The beneficiaries of these programmes are Osun State citizens, so it is wicked of anybody to accuse Aregbesola of not empowering citizens. Only fraudulent people can make such an allegation.

“We do not have the space in this statement to mention all the empowerment programmes of the Aregbesola administration, but there is no project undertaken by the governor that did not directly or indirectly empower citizens.

“Let it be said clearly to all citizens that Aregbesola will not be in government, if the ultimate purpose is not to change lives and grow the economy. There is no empowerment greater than an enabling environment for self actualisation. That is what Aregbesola is providing in Osun and the great effort continues. Aregbesola is working. There is no family in the state that has not been affected positively by his programmes.”