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By Romanus Ugwu
In most parts of the three senatorial zones in Kogi State, the governor, Ahmed Usman Ododo, is evidently enhancing the profile of the hitherto ramshackle, retrogressive state from a glorified village to a metropolitan and cosmopolitan status.
There are visible footprints in the East, West, and Central senatorial zones to confirm that the governor has taken the Renewed Hope Agenda mission of President Bola Tinubu remotely into the hither lands across the state, formally neglected by his predecessors who operated on a constrained financial budget challenge.
From the giant strides in education, health, security, and more importantly, infrastructural development recorded, evidence abound that the governor is on a trajectory to transform the state and project it to the status befitting of a confluence town.
The renovated or newly built healthcare facilities, education, reconstructed and or newly constructed roads, and bridges that were previously death-traps, in addition to building an ultramodern international market in Lokoja, the State capital, among many other signature projects, are assenting evidences of what Kogi State has metaphorically turned into in the last three years of Governor Ododo’s transformative Renewed Hope agenda in collaboration with the President Tinubu-led Federal Government.
Previously, residents and visitors to the strategically located North Central State have continued to lament the utterly deplorable state, crippling neglect and underdevelopment that have defaced the State for several years.
Roads and other infrastructural projects belonging to both state and federal governments were in complete deplorable state of neglect and disrepair, making travelling to the several neighbouring States around Kogi a herculean, nightmarish experience.
The terrible state of the roads, in retrospect, came with deadly consequences of insecurity orchestrated by non-state actors that unleashed mayhem, attacking, kidnapping, and even killing unlucky travellers and instilling fears in many others.
The story was the same in the area of education, with the roofs of several primary, secondary, and even tertiary institutions across the State, particularly in the remote parts, blown off by winds, making them uninhabitable for teaching and learning.
The pupils and students in some of the schools then were left with no other option than to receive lessons in uncomfortable conditions, including sitting on bare floors due to lack of furniture equipment like seats and lockers. The situation even resulted in the closure or abandonment of many of the schools across the three senatorial zones.
Also hunting the state then was the lack of attention in the provision of healthcare facilities, which reflected in the deplorable conditions of many hospitals and cottage medical outfits, resulting in high maternal and infant mortality, especially for patients who had to travel long distances to seek medical attention.
The narrative was the same in the inability of the state government to deploy technological innovation to upgrade it to the status of an advanced model modern territory to compete favourably among its peers across the country.
Today, that story has changed with the ingenuity and developmental strides of the incumbent governor, Ododo, who has tenaciously ensured adequate utilisation of the resources President Tinubu-led federal government has freed to the states after the removal of the fuel subsidy.
Testimonies abound to confirm that the situation has actually changed since Governor Ododo started receiving the unwavering support and funds from President Tinubu, resulting in transforming the State into a living laboratory for what is possible when federal and state governments work in genuine partnership to deliver the dividends of democracy to the citizenry.
Expectedly, it is that good that if other Nigerians are complaining about the suitability of President Tinubu’s decision to remove fuel subsidy, the beneficiaries of the decision, experiencing evidence, will stoutly defend it, having felt the utilisation of the increased fund allocation deployed into the massive infrastructural transformative projects in the State.
Across the state, evidence is overwhelming that the state is no longer waiting for development, as Governor Ododo is already building and delivering them to the people, to the extent of providing a template for a peer review mechanism with the rest of the other states across the country.
The confirmation of the transformative milestones the state has undergone includes standard architectural rural roads, modern markets, primary healthcare, staffing, building of tertiary institutions, model secondary schools, among many others.
Also, in his determination to arrest many of the existential security threats against the progress of the state, the Ododo-led administration had even deployed the services of hunters, vigilantes, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) equipment, and regular security forces to tackle insecurity across the State.
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The governor, represented by the Commissioner for Information and Communication, Hon Kingsley Fanwo, disclosed during a recent inspection tour of the projects in the state and some Local Government Areas (LGAs) by the Renewed Hope Ambassadors (RHAs) in collaboration with the Presidential Media team.
While admitting that the achievements have been facilitated by the support of the federal government, he boasted that the deployment of kinetic and security forces has made it almost impossible for non-state actors to attack schools in the state unless those in Miracle Centre locations.
“As you are entering school premises, you will notice that we have a robust security architecture. The local government chairmen are on top of their game, and the State government has also recruited people into Vigilante Service; given relevant training and equipped with arms. Before now, they operated as ad-hoc, but this governor has integrated them into the mainstream civil service.
“They are now in charge of security. We have the local hunters, the vigilante service and the police force as the kinetic part of the security architecture. We are also deploying technology into it, and right from the control room in Lokoja, they are picking up every movement. With what happened in Olowa, Dekina LGA, we have been able to integrate technology into the security measures. The students are very safe so long as they remain in government-designated centres, not Miracle Centres.
“The two critical pillars of this administration, education and health, are topmost. The government is not just providing the health facilities, equipment and structure; it also knows that it will create room for affordability and to access it, which means taking it to the grassroots.
“Government has invested so much in recruiting teachers, buying books, equipping the laboratories, making the school fees free, and the people have already started receiving the dividends with the high statistics of parents pulling their children from private to public schools,” he said.
In line with the general expectation, the executed projects have attracted assurances of the willingness of the state electorate to massively deliver the desired votes to re-elect President Tinubu in next year’s presidential election, with Governor Ododo commending President Tinubu for providing funds to the state government to support the legacy projects.
Also speaking on his behalf, the State’s Commissioner for Works, Abdulsalami Ozigi Deedat, equally reassured that the federal government support will make President Tinubu’s victory in the state very seamless.
Deedat, in summing up the achievements in education during the visit to Model Science Secondary School, Nagazi in Adavi LGA, said: “Yes, whatever you are reading on social media is not in tandem with what is happening in Kogi. People of Kogi really appreciate Mr. President because we know what he is capable of doing. We know what he is doing on Ajaokuta. We know how he is making resources available to the state as benefits of democracy.”
“In every election, APC is always winning with a very high margin. We came up with the idea of establishing universities for the state, the Confluence University of Science and Technology (CUSTECH), Osara, Kogi State; it is not the only state-owned university. We have three state-owned universities: the Abubakar Audu University in Kogi East, the one in Osara, and the one in Kabba; they are all in operation.
“And this institution is also a symbol of what I call sincere leadership and sincere consolidation, because our former governor, Alhaji Yahaya Bello, initiated the idea. But when Alhaji Ahmed Usman Ododo came on board, as an offshoot of the previous administration, he decided to take it up and take it to completion. It is a secondary school that has all the required components,” he said.
In his synopsis during the inspection, Tunde Rahman, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Special Duties and the Director, Media and Publicity for the RHAs, said that President Tinubu has done so well to deserve re-election in 2027 after freeing up resources to the State governors to facilitate the landmark projects they have executed.
He said: “We went round Kogi West on inspection of projects and Governor Ododo’s intervention in the areas of primary healthcare, road infrastructure across some local governments. We were told that the intervention covers eight out of the 21 LGAs. We saw the achievements in rehabilitation and building of model schools and in the area of erosion control too.”
“For us, this speaks to the character, the person, and the governance philosophy of Governor Ododo. If you look at him closely, you will know that he is very humble, has a sense of fairness and moderation, and speaks to the projects we have inspected so far. The development of inner roads in Mopa, according to the Information Commissioner, was the first of its kind, which speaks of a governor who is egalitarian and who wants development across the board. He also purchased 30 fully-equipped ambulances across the state.
“We also saw what has been done in just two years at Kogi State University in Kabba, and it confirms that the governor has shown clearly that he believes in grassroots development, education, and human empowerment. All these have been possible due to the reforms the federal government has put in place in freeing resources to the nationals, and it equally confirms that President Tinubu has done so well to deserve a second term because the achievements will speak for him to get re-elected,” he said.
The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Public Communications, Sunday Dare, admitted that the projects aligned with President Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda, noting: “The agenda of President Tinubu is well and alive in infrastructure, education and agriculture. Definitely, the hopes of Nigerians have been renewed, both at the federal and state levels.”
The RHAs toured projects in Lokoja, Okene, Yagba West and Kogi East, visiting upgraded primary healthcare centres, the ultramodern International Market and Federal Teaching Hospital in Lokoja, where state officials testified that investments were improving access to quality healthcare.
