Be honest, transparent in governance, Hakeem Alao tells Gov Makinde

By Lai Mahmood

Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State has been called upon to evolve policies that will address the peculiar situation of the people in the state in his fight against Corona Virus (Covid-19) just as he is also enjoined to be honest and more transparent in governance.

This was contained in a release by Mr Oyedele Hakeem Alao, the candidate of Alliance for Democracy (AD) in the 2019 governorship election in the state, which was made available to the press in Ibadan through Omotayo Iyanda, the head of his media office.

Hakeem Alao, in the release, asked Governor Makinde “to evolve more efficient, effective and practicable policies that will suit our peculiarities to overpower the pandemic and be honest and more transparent in governance” as the number of cases of Covid-19 kept increasing every day in the country, including Oyo State.

Rather than “copy and paste” approach of the advanced countries as social distancing, lockdown, stay at home, curview, Hakeem Alao recommended “strict and compulsory testing, aggressive tracing, isolation of those tested positive, emergency measures, making the people’s immunity strong, adequate provision of basic needs for the people, particularly food, as this time, in our history, considering the deficits in our socio-political and economic system, calls for more empathy and kindness.

“Emphasis should be placed more on sound hygiene and making food and other essential needs available to the people while looking at the way to strengthen the state and its people for economic survival during and after the Covid-19 era,” adding that the secret of the quick recovery of Governor Makinde, if it was anything to go by, “should be urgently domesticated, popularized and implemented to save our people.”

Asking Governor Makinde to be honest and more transparent, Hakeem Alao observed that the money donated so far to combat Covid-19 had not been put into good use by the Governor Makinde administration, while noting that no good report had also been received about the new(ly) opened Oyo State Covid-19 Walk/Drive Through Testing Centre at Lekan Salami Stadium, Adamasingba, Ibadan, and there was also an allegation of inflated figures of the budget for the construction of three motor parks in the state.

The AD candidate echoes further, “As we struggle with the Covid-19 pandemic, Governor Makinde should be honest and more transparent with the way he runs the government under his leadership as there was an information in the public that the budget for the construction of three motor parks has been corruptly inflated by the executive arm itself or the personnel in the concerned ministry, which has allegedly been reported to have led to the deployment of the staff of the ministry to another ministry.”

Requesting Governor Makinde to formally come open and clear the air on these allegations, Hakeem Alao advised that the governor “should not take the people of Oyo State for granted just because of the “popularity” being enjoyed now and the struggle against Covid-19 which is taking our attention away from real governance matters. Governor Makinde is hereby enjoined to formally come open and clear the air.

Buttressing his stance about evolving policies and strategies that would suit our peculiar socio-political economic make-up, Hakeem Alao said that social distancing, lockdown, stay at home and curfew, which were all the advanced and middle-income countries’ strategies, “could work well in those climes because of the way their social and labour system has been organized where majority of their citizens, if not all, are well known and planned for in terms of social security, health insurance, accommodation, jobs and amenities provision and where the citizens are well statistically captured in their taxation net.

“In as much as the 89.2% (ILO 2018) of our population, according to the report by Africa’s Purse, operate in the informal employment sector, including the SMEs, it will be difficult to contain the pandemic if we continue to copy and paste the advanced countries’ strategies in our own approach to see the end of the epidemic.

“Rather than going the way of the American, European and Asian hook, line and sinker, why not fashion out approaches that will suit our peculiarities as a people and backed them up with a few of the western strategies that support good hygiene.”

Commenting on the production and free distribution of face masks to the residents of the state, Hakeem Alao maintained that, “producing and making available 1,000,000 face masks and compulsory for the people is a policy that has issues of its own.

“Although it is a good idea to produce the masks locally, issues with the idea of the compulsory use of masks include violation of human rights, possible hazard of improper use, implication of using only one mask repeatedly, acute shortage of the face guards for the use of the medical and health personnel, more so there are over five million people in the state.”

The AD chieftain submitted that “We need more of pathways for sustainable growth, economic diversification and inclusion, as suggested by the Africa Purse’s report published on 12 April as there were lessons in the “Tanzanian approach against Covid-19” applauded by the World Bank (WB), according to the report, ‘as one of the best examples’ in Africa ‘for its strategic approach that considers the best of its political economy and well-being of its society.’”

Looking at the efforts against Covid-19 by the Governor Makinde administration so far, Hakeem Alao stated that some of them, “to some degree”, were commendable, but were not enough “as copy and paste of the western world approaches to fight the pandemic will never be adequately effective to contain the scourge in an African setting as ours is a place where majority of our people earn their living in the informal sector”, adding that, “There is so much hunger in the society and we have seen a surge in armed robbery recently as citizens in the informal sector have found it hard to survive.

“We can only hope that the food distribution intervention, which the state government has promised to start next week, will be handled in a proper manner and douse the tension in the state.”