By Bashir Adefaka
If the fresh response, to yet another Premium Times report, that Minister of Communications Abdulraheem Adebayo Shittu duly fulfilled National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) requirements being elected member of Oyo State House of Assembly upon graduation is anything to go by, the governorship aspirant in Oyo State will have no further comment to make but continue in earnest his political struggle for Agodi Government House, Ibadan.
This is as a former Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice in Oyo State, Mr. Adebayo Mutalubi Ojo, has said.
The former Commissioner described as trumped up allegation, the report that Dr. Shittu skipped the required post graduation youth service exercise.
Ojo said: “On the trumped-up allegation that Alhaji Adebayo Shittu, the Minister of Communications skipped the National Service.
“We must all give the due respect to our Leaders. the Great Awo & Uncle Bola Ige( of blessed memories) who both opined then that being a member of the parliament is equivalent to National Service.
“Having served meritoriously as a member of the old Oyo State House of Assembly from 1978 to 1983, Alhaji Adebayo Shittu had duly served Nigeria.”
On this note, case closed, a respondent told The DEFENDER Friday morning.
Another sourced, citing the NYSC Act as amended in 1985 two years after Shittu completed his service as member of Parliament, quoted as follows:
”
The National Youth Service Corps Decree 1993 section 2 subsection (1) it is stipulated that;
“With effect from 1st August, 1985, a person shall NOT be called upon to serve in the service corps if, at the date of graduation or obtaining his diploma or other professional qualification” :
He is over the age of thirty (30) years
He has served in the Armed Forces of the Federation or the Nigeria Police Force for a period of more than nine months; or
He is a member of staff of any of the following:
The Nigerian Security Organization or
The State Security Service, or
The National Intelligence Agency or
The Defence Intelligence Service
He has been conferred with any National Honour.
These categories of persons are therefore exempted from service and issued with the Certificates of Exemption.” He quoted.
It will be recalled that Shittu was about the luckiest of youths not only to be adopted by the Premier of the defunct Western Region and Leader of the progressives at the time he finished, but also 25, he was one of great Nigerians that drafted the four cardinal programme of then Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) led by Awolowo.
The manifesto that young Adebayo was part of its writing helped the UPN take over Lagos, Ogun, Old Oyo, Old Ondo and Bendel states at that time of the Second Republic.
It will be recalled that the NCNC/NPC alliance led by Chief Ladoke Akintola had taken over the Western Region from Action Group during the First Republic imbroglio that led first to Awolowo’s imprisonment and later assassination of the Prime Minister Alhaji Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Finance Minister Okotie-Eboh and Premier of Northern Region.
That impasse ended the First Republic with Aguiyi Ironsi installing himself as first Nigerian military Head of State followed by General Yakubu Gowon, then General Olusegun Obasanjo who then orchestrated the democratic transmission that led to the formation of UPN among other.
Dr. Abdulraheem Adebayo Shittu at age 25 was part of the historic process that successfully recovered the Western Region now South West from the Conservatives back to the progressives with Chief Jeremiah Obafemi Awolowo regaining his grip as the Leader.
