LG Boss Replies Critics

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Chairman of Ifako-Ijaiye Local Government Area, Lagos State, Mr. Demola Doherty has described those who accused him of maladministration as disgruntled politicians who are only interested in getting money from the council for their selfish interest.

Doherty who was reacting to a petition signed by groups of Muslim, Christian and elders in the community against his second term ambition, accused his critics of being insincere, adding that they wrote the petition on the prompting of a frustrated chairmanship aspirant in the local government who is interested in contesting the October 22 council poll in the area.

Reeling out his achievements in the local government since 2008 when he became chairman, Doherty stated:

“In two and half years that I have been there nobody has done as much as I have done. Even the leaders, Muslims, Christians and traditionalists, in that local government have acknowledged that nobody has done as much as Doherty has done in two and half years. We have had chairmen who spent four years and even eight years in Ifako-Ijaiye local government, none of them have done as much as I have done in two and half years. The records are there for everybody to see.

“I have taken care of members of my party and executed a lot of projects to benefit the people of the community and they are all appreciative of everything that I have done. That is why they are clamouring for me to continue. For instance, the human rights community in the area recently gave me an award as the best performing local government chairman.

“We constructed 33 classrooms in two and half years for pupils of primary schools in the area. When we got there, we discovered that there was a lot of overcrowding in the primary schools. You have about 70 and 80 pupils in a class. We said no, this did not happen when we were in primary school and we were going to correct it. We built schools in Bishop Oluwole, we built in St. Kizito, we built in Fred Williams, we built in Ogundimu. Currently, we are building in Ajuwon. We did 400 benches and 180 chairs for the primary schools. We are going to commission two toilets for the schools soon. Apart from the classrooms, we gave all the pupils exercise books and other writing materials.

“The so-called elders who wrote the petition are not the real elders in the area. These people are disgrunlted elements, they are the ones behind all these fabrications. We gave the Christian community in Ifako-Ijaiye five slots to go to Jerusalem last year and anytime the leaders are doing anything we always give them financial assistance or material support. During Xmas and other festivals, we give them rice and other things to celebrate the occasions. The muslim community too, whenever they are celebrating their festivals, we give them rams, rice and other things during these periods. The grievance of the so-called Muslim leaders who signed the petition was that we used to give them eight rams but that last year we gave them five. Should that be the basis for them to write rubbish against us.

“My job is to develop the community. Some of them want us to give them all the money that should have been used to develop the community. This is not possible.

“We have also been rehabilitating all the roads in the local government and this has been attested to by residents who have been commending us,” he stated.

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