By Charles Okogene
For those of us who are incorrigible followers of the beautiful round leather game, football, the maxim that “it is not over until it is over” is a statement of fact that we have seen replayed over and over again, so I need not bore you, my readers, with instances.
Abiodun
It is also common among the Igbos of the Southeast to say that “onu ku njo, ga eku ma,” meaning literally that the mouth that talked bad about someone will one day talk good of him.
The above sayings are the lot of the chief executive of Ogun State, Prince Dapo Abiodun, who is now one of the best-performing governors in the Southwest.
Abiodun came to office on May 29, 2019, after defeating PDP and ADP candidates in a keenly contested election, and all the eyes of residents of border towns like Ijoko, Akute, Agbara, Mowe, and Lambe were focused on him. Yes, they were right and justified to believe that the ‘messiah’ had come in human form in Abiodun because, apart from not having any form of government presence in some of their communities, they boasted of the worst network of roads that could connect them to Lagos State, where the majority of them work or do business.
Rather than listen to their cries for years by focusing his development projects on those areas capable of increasing the internally generated revenue of the state, Abiodun initially decided to continue his development agenda in the Abeokuta and Ijebu-Ode axis of the state—an action that elicited unprintable words from the residents. They had no good words for him, while some abandoned their property in the area and moved back to Lagos. That was their lot in those areas.
However, today, things have changed. The communities are wearing a new look with the rehabilitation of almost all the roads in the areas, while those who abandoned their landed property are moving back there, just as those who sold them outrightly, believing that those towns were government-forgotten areas, are biting their fingers now and saying, “Had I known, I would not have sold the house.”
From the Toyin border area between Ogun and Lagos states, it has been a season of new songs for Abiodun since he completed the road leading to Giwa in Ogun State from Lagos State. The more than five-kilometer-long road, which was last rehabilitated by the military administration, was left to rot by successive civilian governments after Aremo Segun Osoba, who is credited with having done that of Toyin to Agbado, where there is now a train station.
According to one of the residents of the area who simply gave his name as Sunday, an auto spare parts seller, “That he did this road is not even the issue, but the rate at which it was done is what makes me believe that Nigeria can work if our leaders want it. Before, I used to battle dust and low sales, but since the road was fixed, I can wear one shirt twice to shop, saving me money for soap to wash them, while sales have increased as my customers, who stopped coming to my shop because of the bad road, have all returned. From Toyin to Giwa, which used to take me two hours of travel time, now takes me an average of five minutes. God bless Abiodun.”
The same goes for Iya Sikira, who runs an Amala joint at Giwa Junction, who told us, “Since this road was repaired by Abiodun, my customers have increased. I don’t even satisfy them as they keep coming from morning to night. Before, I would cook and not sell all. I would have left here if I had the money to rent another shop in Iju Ishaga.”
Another area that has experienced Abiodun’s transformation is the Epe/Ijebu Ode road. This is a road that had become impassable and led to a hike in transport fare from Epe to Ijebu-Ode, but since it was rehabilitated, the people have been singing a new song to praise Abiodun.
Akute/Ajuwon, from the police station down to one of the bridges started by Ibikunle Amosun but abandoned, was like a war zone riddled with potholes occasioned by bombs before Abiodun’s tractors came to the rescue. Today, the less than five-kilometer road is as smooth as a day-old baby’s head. This road connects one to Alagbole from Ajuwon if one is coming from Iju.
What about Akute Denro Ishasi Ojodu? This road has been completed and opened for public use, and commuters, motorists, and pedestrians cannot stop thanking Abiodun for coming to their rescue. The same goes for Navy College Road, Ota, which has undergone transformation, and the residents are overjoyed about it.
Before the curtain falls on Prince Dapo Abiodun’s tenure on May 29, 2027, the Lagos/Ota/Sango Abeokuta Expressway (ongoing), which has been crying for rehabilitation since the days of the former regime of the late President Muhammadu Buhari, would have been completely fixed with the rate reconstruction work is going. The same goes for the Alagbole/Akute road, which is also ongoing.
By the time political leadership changes hands from Abiodun to whoever, not only will he have left the state without abandoned projects he started the residents of the border towns, who had earlier thought they were forgotten by the government, will know and remember forever that a man called Prince Dapo Abiodun once governed the state from 2019 to 2027.
… Okogene, publisher of charlesokogene.com, lives in Lambe, Ogun State.
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