My attention has been drawn to a piece written by one Kennedy Ikantu Peretei, which has been in circulation on the social media under the title “AKEREDOLU’S MISRULE IN ONDO STATE (10): FAMILY ON LOOTING SPREE”. As part of the bunch of lies and puerile misinformation exhibited in that piece, Mr. Peretei stated thus: Mrs Betty Akeredolu on her part, has ensured that no board is constituted for the Ondo State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission (OSOPADEC). All the BEMORE and FOWOSO projects are fully funded by OSOPADEC. Short of directly signing cheques, Betty is the Alpha and Omega of OSOPADEC. The Commission has not executed a single project since the inception of the Akeredolu tenure” Actually, it should not be my business to respond to this piece since I am not a media aide to Governor Akeredolu and his family, neither am I employed as their solicitor; but there are areas of the piece which, if not responded to, may continue to mislead the good people of Ondo State.
As the chairman of OSOPADEC during the period alluded to, I will be doing the good people of Ondo State, especially the great people of Ilaje and Ese-Odo LGAs, a disservice if I keep quiet in the face of this falsification. This kind of lies and deceptions being told by Mr. Peretei are akin to the deception tactics of Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, who said, “If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes accepted as truth,” and that is why the Holy Scriptures says, “answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes”.
On the issue of the BEMORE project, one of the pet projects of the First Lady in which OSOPADEC has the rare privilege of collaboration, I make bold to say that it’s a project that is of profound benefits to our people. The project suits our interests so much that if the opportunity presents itself one million times, we shall continue to support it because it is laudable and beneficial to our people.
It should be known to Mr. Peretei and his ilk that the best assets any nation or community can boast of is not the minerals or natural resources but human resource or human capital. Switzerland as a country cannot boast of any single natural resource. Still, the best chocolates, best wristwatches, best pharmaceuticals all come from Switzerland apart from its reputation in the banking sector. This the country has been able to achieve on the strength of human capital. Therefore, any nation that wants to grow must be ready to develop its human capital primarily through education, both cognitive and vocational.
In the year 2017, when Arabirin started the BEMORE programme as part of the pet projects, she did not solicit monetary support from the state, not even from OSOPADEC, to commence her project. The falsification of facts in public domain there shows that Mr Peretei lacks relevant information about the BEMORE project. He is therefore advised to take the pain to ask for facts rather than exhibiting crude ignorance in the name of criticism.
The BEMORE programme is established to enhance the capacity of the girl child, especially in the areas of ICT and solar technology development, courteous living; networking; and other forms of vocational training. It is the values and merits in this project that the Board and management of OSOPADEC were attracted to, and we decided to enrol a few of our girl children for the programme. The participants sponsored were carefully selected from all the thirty-two (32) public secondary schools in Ilaje and Ese Odo Local Government Areas such that no school produced less than two participants from the onset of the programme.
The breakdown is as follows: in the year 2018, OSOPADEC sponsored 120 girls, all expenses fully paid; in the year 2019, the figure rose to 140 girls; in the year 2020, there was no BEMORE programme because of the COVID 19 lockdown. But by the year 2021, the programme has become so popular among our folks in Ilaje and Ese Odo Local Government areas that the selection process became so competitive, and we were left with no other choice than to increase the figure to 150 girls. This was achieved due to intense lobbying of the organizers of the programme because the maximum capacity for the 2021 Ondo State Summer Boot camp was just 400 girls.
It will interest Mr Peretei to know that in each of the batches of the programme, participants went home with a laptop and a solar home system; they were also kitted with at least two pairs of BEMORE customized T-shirts, Jeans and canvas, apart from the fact that they were quartered and fed three times daily throughout the duration of the summer Bootcamp. The skills acquired during this programme transcends the honoraria paid to the instructors when weighed on the scale of value. I’m sure Mr. Peretei will know that all of these could not have come for free.
It was the Board and management of OSOPADEC under our watch that approached the organizers of the BEMORE Summer BootCamp Program so that our girls could benefit from the rare developmental programme.
Therefore, as against the crude and untrue impression that Arabirin Betty Akeredolu was feasting on the resources of OSOPADEC, she was actually the one generously giving out to our children. I challenge Mr. Pertei to visit the public secondary schools in Ilaje and Ese-odo to interview the beneficiaries of the BEMORE programme and their principals to authenticate our claims on this matter.
Mr. Peretei refused to see what OSOPADEC did between 2017 – 2021 because he was blinded by his mischievous tendencies. Let me elucidate a few:
i. As part of our human capital development program, OSOPADEC, under our watch religiously resuscitated and paid over N200,000,000.00 (Two Hundred Million Naira) as bursary and scholarship to all qualified students of Ilaje and Ese Odo origin in higher institutions.
ii. Over 100 housing units which are all at various degrees of completion, were embarked upon to make life comfortable for workers attached to our public institutions in the riverine area
iii. Several kilometres of wooden walk-ways were embarked upon and completed as a means of facilitating transportation within the communities in the riverine areas during the period
iv. The Aboto – Atijere road was awarded, and today, it is at nothing less than 40% (Forty Percent) completion
v. The asphalt laying of the Alape junction – Araromi seaside road was also awarded, and work is ongoing.
Apart from these, so many other projects like the Aboto water (treatment, distribution and reticulation project) that were abandoned by the previous administration was completed and commissioned by Arakunrin Akeredolu, SAN, just to mention a few.
For Mr Peretei to have alluded so ignorantly that Arabirin did not want a Board to be put in place for OSOPADEC is nothing but a mischievous thought. In the light of the above, let Peretei tell the whole world what Arabinrin Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu stands to benefit from not disallowing the composition of a Board for OSOPADEC. He should therefore try something else because this is nothing but a wicked lie from the pit of hell.
E signed:
Honourable Olugbenga Edema