Fashola’s 2nd Tenure: What The People Say

As Governor Babatunde Fashola’s administration clocks one year in his second term in office, EROMOSELE EBHOMELE takes a look at how he has fared in the eyes of residents of Lagos State.

On 29 May, 2011, at the Tafawa Balewa Square, Onikan, Lagos, venue of the swearing-in ceremony of Governor Babatunde Fashola for a renewed mandate of four years, the excited governor, after all the trouble that followed his campaign for re-election, told Lagosians that he was humbled that the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, allowed him to use the platform.

Then he confirmed that he was elected based on a total vote cast of 1,509,113 votes “which now stands as the highest number of votes ever delivered for any candidate in any state in our political history. I understand the import of that mandate. It is a mandate in support of the continuation of the transformation we have collectively achieved in the last four years. It is a mandate for good governance. It is a mandate for the continuation of the people-oriented policies that takes us daily towards a brighter and rewarding future.

He added: “Let me assure you all that as leader of the team, I cherish the mandate, I am fully conscious of the import for your hopes and aspirations and I remain as committed today as I was in 2007 to do my very best to remain worthy of this mandate.”

However, a year after the hopes of residents of the state were re-kindled, the people have developed different opinions about the governor’s second term in office. While some believe he has done his best to keep up the pace in the development of the state, many others say he has relented when compared with the zeal with which he touched almost all the sectors in the first year in his first term in office between 2007 and 2008.

“Within that period, he had done a lot that got his name ringing bells around the state and in the country,” says Adefemi Arowolo, an accountant and resident of the state. “Even children began to understand the meaning of development. Remember the Bus Rapid Transit Scheme? Even though it was begun by his predecessor, Fashola didn’t kill the dream like other politicians and leaders would do, but he ensured its full implementation.

“Also, within the same period, he started planting trees and beautifying the state even though during that time, he was castigated by the residents who did not understand why he was planting flowers everywhere and demolishing shanties. Before long, they began to sing his praise.

“It is not so currently. The man seems to have relaxed a whole lot, and some of those evils he put a stop to then are currently rearing their heads again. To me, he is living more on his past glory than on his promises for the people,” he added.

Arowolo may have been re-echoing the opinion of Chief Guy Ikokwu, Second Republic politician and chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who was recently quoted as saying that, “Lagos is not working as it was during Fashola’s first term. The government is not actually doing what it proposed to do. The rural roads and drainage in the local councils are bad. There is too much corruption at the local councils using the name of the government and ruling party, ACN, as if the government can no longer be checked by anybody.

He urged the Lagos State government to review the Tenancy Law which was passed by the state House of Assembly as, according to him, “majority of landlords are against it and are taking their houses off the market. Majority of tenants don’t like it because it is making houses more difficult to get as landlords are not consenting and are charging more money for one year rent. Landlords are not happy with the tenement rate, it is very high and most establishments can’t afford it. The state and federal governments should decide who controls Value Added Tax (VAT).”

The Executive Secretary of the Orile-Iganmu Progressive Association (OIPA), Femi Omikunle, said recently that though the people of his area could feel the presence of government in the area of some roads that have been rehabilitated, the government still had a lot of challenges to grapple with.

“We wouldn’t say we know the inner workings of Governor Fashola but as a community-based organisation, we are not totally satisfied with what Fashola is doing, especially in this second dispensation. One area the government of Fashola has not touched at all is human development.

“He has developed road networks, cleansed the environment but he has failed to give the people opportunity for self-employment and human development. We had expected that soft loans would be made available through the local government for small-scale businesses,” he said.

Some other Lagosians maintained that the administration of Babatunde Fashola, may have been troubled by the crisis in the health sector as well as the lingering problem the state government has with commercial motorcycle riders, popularly called okada.

Currently, the state government is slugging it out in court with the 788 medical doctors who had worked in the various state hospitals of the state before they were fired for embarking on a three-day warning strike that later culminated into an indefinite strike called by the state Medical Guild on behalf of the doctors.

This came at a time the court ruled in favour of okada riders in the case they filed against the Fashola administration concerning restrictions in the ban on their activities in the Ikeja area of the state as well as the rate at which their motorcycles were seized by government officials and task force at every opportunity.

Justice Stephen Adah of the Federal High Court sitting in Ikeja, ruled that the okada riders had the right to live and do business like every other Nigerian, adding: “Nigeria is a democratic country. If a state government believed there is a justifiable reason to ban anybody or the operation of the commercial motorcycle riders, it should approach the state House of Assembly.

“The state government cannot arbitrarily stop the operation of the motorcycle riders in any part of the state. If it does, such order will be deemed dictatorial, unconstitutional, null and void.”

The judge also slammed the government for confiscating motorcycles belonging to those who are deemed to have committed offences, adding that it was the court alone that is empowered by law to order the seizure of properties. And that currently, there is no law justifying the seizure of motorcycles as ordered by the state government.

The grouse okada riders have with the state government currently is that its officials have not adhered to the court ruling and have continued the indiscriminate seizure of motorcycles.

“The man is a lawyer and should have known that most of us are enlightened. We were only pushed into this business because of the country’s situation. We are angry that he is yet to obey the ruling, even though he knows the importance of the rule of law,” Odim Agbakalu, a commercial motorcycle rider told P.M.NEWS.

According to him, this action, coupled with the health crisis in the state, makes some Lagosians think that second term for political office holders may not be the best. “You can sample opinions if you think it is not true,” he added.

Those who think he is doing his best also believe that it is still too early to judge the governor and say he should be given another one year. Stressing this point, Olukayode Salako of Fasholamania, a group favourably disposed to the administration of the governor, said: “For those of us who can be realistic enough, Lagos is still working progressively and satisfactorily. This is definitely not the way the state was handed over to Fashola. This is not the way Lagos City was before now. The present government has changed so many things.

“The present government has indeed transformed Lagos. And I believe the process of reforming and transforming the socio-economic environment of the state for better is still ongoing and will continue to be a process of progressive governance.”

As if the governor is aware of the varying opinions about his administration, he and his commissioners have continued to give the government’s stewardship in the last one year. Fashola recently explained that his administration was consolidating on the first term agenda because works are on-going where the last administration stopped in various sectors which include education, health, housing, transportation, road rehabilitation and construction, environment, employment, waste to wealth and security among others. This was aimed at disabusing the minds of the people that he had slowed down.

According to him, “the minimum wage has depleted the funds available to the government for social services by N2 billion every month. From all computations, the Lagos government will need between N5.5 billion and N7 billion to pay its over 50,000 workers and political appointees against a monthly revenue profile of between N18 billion and N20 billion, salaries will gulp about 40 per cent of the state’s expenditure.”

Since July 4, 2011, when Fashola swore in 37 members of his cabinet, the government’s scorecard among others include payment of N149 million bursary award to 3,028 students; recruitment of 2,000 undergraduates and graduates for this year’s enumeration of companies, industries and small-scale businesses in the state under the Enterprises Registration and Identification Agents, ENTRIDA programme of the state government; provision of medicare for 12 beneficiaries of its free Cleft Lip and Palate Corrective Surgery Programme in collaboration with Health, Education, Works and Shelter HEWS Foundation.

He has also delivered on his housing promise even though Lagosians think they are not affordable and, according to the Chairman of the Public Works Corporation (LSPWC), Gbenga Akintola, the State Government has delivered 470 roads in the last one year.