Why I consider Gov. Fayemi as the most qualified to succeed President Buhari come 2023 Says Barr. Ogunmiloyom
By Wasiu Owolewa
A Special Adviser to State Minister on FCT, Barrister Ade Kingsley Ogunmiloyo, has made his views known on why he considered Ekiti state governor, His Excellency, Dr. John Kayode Fayemi as the most qualified to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari come 2023
The legal Professional aired his views on this with other issues of national importance in an interview with newsmen in Abuja this afternoon.
Barrister Kingsley Ade Ogunmiloyo also took time to talk on the numerous achievements of Governor John Kayode Fayemi in Ekiti state
Here is the Excerpts of the interview:
Can we meet you sir?
Ade Ogunmiloyo is my name, a lawyer by profession, public servant, but could consider myself as partly politician by my current appointment as one of the Special Advisers to the Hon. Minister for FCT, Dr Hajia Ramotu Tijani.
I am a native of Ado-Ekiti, the capital city of Ekiti State and I work with Petroleum Technology Development Fund.
I am an ardent supporter of Dr. John Kayode Fayemi, the Executive Governor of Ekiti State.
Q: It is generally believed that any governor that wins a second term don’t usually perform in office, how will you assess Gov Fayemi second time administration?
Barr. Ogunmiloyo: There is no doubt that we have seen a lot of improvements since ascension of JKF as Governor of Ekiti State, even though there is insecurity everywhere, but despite the high level crime rate in Nigeria as a whole, Ekiti is relatively peaceful and if not for one or two skirmishes around, we can really say that he has done well in that regard. Infrastructure wise, of course people cannot see that now but when you think deep and when you access what he is putting in place right now, the successive government will be the one to reap the benefit because when you embark on infrastructural development, it may not manifest immediately, but some will be visible for those that have eyes to see because no matter your level of performance, your opposition will never appreciate or praise you, but you can see that he is laying foundations for better Ekiti tomorrow.
Q: Do you also share in the vision of Southwest 2023 Presidency Agenda?
Barrister Ogunmiloyo: Precisely it’s evidence that the Presidency will emerge from the south west, but the question now is who will emerge. And when you look at the people who are expressing interest for the nation’s number one seat of course they’ve not really shown interest, then you look at the quality of those people who are putting themselves forward and with due respect, we have one which is old enough to be our grandfather, we have another one who is very young, vibrant and celebral, who doesn’t talk much or engage in dirty politics, but a bridge between the old and the young.
When you look at the leaders of other countries like Canada, France, Austria, Finland, Holland Netherland, they are just little over 30 years old. So, it is time for us to move to that sphere and one of the contenders fits in to that precisely without mentioning name, I’m sure you understand who I am talking about, that is Dr John Kayode Fayemi. You can imagine that for the first time in history, they don’t talk about Ekiti as a state where you have people who tends to disrespect elders. We can see the quality. This is how a President should be. Somebody that can identify elders, someone that doesn’t talk much. You should not hear President every time saying everything and that is Dr Fayemi. Through his work, that is how you can deduce whether he is good or not and we have other one which is our grand father that is Senator Ahmed Tunubu from Lagos State, he has done well, he has made people, but we are talking about quality now, talking of modern day politics, talking of moving forward. With due respect to elders, they’ve been tested and we keep on hearing youths are the leaders of tomorrow, so we assume tomorrow is here now and Dr Kayode Fayemi fits that shoe let me put it that way.
Q:You’re one of the leading advocate for Southwest Agenda 2023 Presidency, how can it be achieved without going contrary to the perceived polity of the Southwest agenda?
Barr. Ogunmiloyo: It’s achievable of course, though we may encounter a bit of resistance in the beginning and it’s all about negotiation. Don’t be surprised that one day you will see Dr Kayode Fayemi and Senator Ahmed Tinubu sitting down together, talking, planning how this thing will come into reality. Whether we like it or not, we will still refer to him (Senator Tinubu) and we will make him realise why it is important that he supports Dr Kayode Fayemi. We will want him to reason that he is our father, in Yoruba we call it baba oba, Baba Oba is more than Oba. So we all know our up bringing in Yoruba land. Give to ceaser what belongs to ceaser. And there is no doubt about that when times comes, I am sure we will follow Dr Fayemi to go and see our baba oba and I don’t see any problem in it. I think its a realisable project.
Q: You have been a leading voice in Youths Empowerment, how can this boost the 2023 Agenda?
Barr. Ogunmiloyo: I am from a very humble background and without the help of others and of God, I will not be where I am today, that is why it is important that we assist each other. You are right about that, with God’s grace I have been trying my best to assist our youths without much noise about it. I will take you back to when I contested for Senate in 2011, at that time, I was fully at home in Ekiti and I realise that we have a lot to do and I promise then that if I have any opportunity, I will see how I can use that positively and fortunately for me, I serve as a Special Adviser to the Director General of NDLEA which fortunately coincides with the time they did their recruitment and i made sure that a lot of qualified Ekiti indigenes were employed and precisely because there is always this lack of information about empowerment, there is always this lack of sensitisation and I made sure that I reach out to people one on one and I had interaction with them and it was within that short time I contested, so I still had a lot of contacts and I use every opportunity I have in terms of looking for work because there is no point in going to Ekiti and continue to give them money, so I decided to teach them how to fish rather than continue to give them fish at all times. I was even shocked sometimes, some people will just send me top up alert of ten thousand naira, they will just call me and say oga, I hope you got that, we just thought about you today and say that without you, I will not be this, without you, I won’t get married but today I thank God. By the way oga they’ve just promoted me, you know all those things makes me happy. Again when I came to PTDF I ensure that most of the time when we are doing our scholarship, trainings, I reach out to a lot of people in Ekiti, inform them how the programme can benefit them and you see them applying. And again by virtue of my several connections with people and the Presidency, wherever I see the opportunity in Abuja, I make sure I get as much as I want, I practically beg that please if you have space o. And that’s the way to move forward.
Q: Can we view your generosity towards needy and less privilege as politically motivated?
Barr. Ogunmiloyo: It is not political motivated because I am a public servant as I told you and I still have couple of years to spend in the service. We just need to help each other to move forward, Ekiti needs to move. We have many certificate laying down at home without being in use, so we need to really assist each other, there is no political undertone, I cut across the PDP to APC. I am blind when it comes to helping each other.
I believe that two heads is better than one and more heads is better than two.
APU is our organization. I have a good relationship with the people of Ekiti state otherwise they will not honour me with an Eminent award, which they did recently, we are about seven that were honoured, myself, our mummy, Prof Adelabu, former Governor of Ekiti State, Senator Fatima Rasaki, Zubair, Jasper Adepoju, Jibo Ajila and Chief Imam because they recognised our contributions. And not only that, I have gotten so many honorary awards and title, several Ado-Ekiti indigenes call me Oluomo, and I don’t think if I have done anything. Of course, its not nice for me to be talking about myself that is why I find it very uncomfortable and difficult, I think I will leave that to Ado-Ekiti people to talk about. I have done what I am supposed to do. For example, during the pandemic, there is what we call Ado-ekiti development condition, we realise several millions of Naira and I made sure that I reached out to a lot of Ado-Ekiti indigenes from Prof Adeoluwa, Rector, Ekiti State University of Education Ikere, Prof Olanipekun, Deputy Governor, Chief Bisi Egbeyemi and host of others and I put that foundation together and everybody contributed immensely and make sure that throughout that stay at home period, that we were providing food, money in cash to Ado-Ekiti people among so many other things.
The people that love football, I created so many sporting activities for them, this I have been doing since 2009, a lot of my mates who are deceased, I made sure I reached out to their children, to their wives at a time. I have been giving the N200,000 (Two hundred thousand) each as far back as 2007 because if they are alive today, only God knows what they would have become and I could be in that situation too.
(Laughs)…its evident and I can assure you that if we do election more than five times, a prospective candidate of APC will always emerge. That’s a party where when you look at the caliber of people there, you will be proud to associate yourself with. This is the party that thinks about the project from the scratch. These are the people that with little amount of money available to Ekiti state, you can see that, when you look at our budget, what we get in Ekiti state as allocation, most of it goes to paying salaries, but that leftover which is very small, we are still able to see a lot of things, and you can see, because Dr Kayode Fayemi in particular by virtue of his relationship with the outside world, it tends to harness and bring a lot of good things to Ekiti. He relates very well with United Nations, and the people he relates very well with. You know there are lots of supporting organization in the world. And again, look at the federal level, he is the Chairman of the Governor’s forum, is that not a joy for us?
When they talk about Ekiti, they were talking of Ekiti that we are the leader of all the States. And when he speaks you will want to listen to him, you want to associate yourself with him, you can see that a lot of thing he is doing is something that you will be proud of to be associated with Ekiti. So someone like that, I am hundred percent sure leading an office will bring something that is better and people like that don’t make rash decision and I can assure you by now that Fayemi will get something that Ekiti people will be proud of. So there is no doubt that whoever he present will match.
I am going to surprise you, Fayemi happens to be Hon. Osatoyinbo’s very good friend, and that is my uncle. I was living abroad when brother Tope Osatoyinbo got married, he was the best man, I was there and we have a lot of close relationship with his brother, Uncle Shege, we live in the same house before and he was my senior in Christ school, buy virtue of me being a public servant, I don’t really relate with him but I study him very well, I read about him, I ask questions trying to get contrary opinion about him and everything still come to the same positives, so I think if I ask people around and with what I have seen, I shouldn’t have a doubt about his potentials, he has a lot of potentials and I can’t wait for an Ekiti man to be the President of Nigeria.
Historically, Ekiti as always being refers to as politically unstable, how do you compare the peaceful environment now to how it used to be before Fayemi administration?
We were known to be land of honour, along the line, when development came, when politics came back, things changed and don’t forget that we are talking of 1999 now, that was our developmental stage, but unfortunately I was still abroad that time but I made sure that I come to Nigeria every month, ask anybody even while I was abroad and I read a lot about Ekiti because I am very passionate about Ekiti that is why when I speak English you will see that Ekiti will still be reflecting even when I was in UK, America or Vienna, all the people I relate with were Ekiti apart from the people I went to school with. So going back to your question, we had lots of skirmishes, lots of thuggery. You know youths follow leaders, elders and am sure then people thought when the new systems came in, a lot of people abandoned what they were doing and the only way they can make themselves visible was politicking and when you are politicking it comes with so many things, thuggery a lot of issues, you wrestle power and a lot of things come with it. As at that time it was like that till 2003 but fortunately for all that time, we had His Excellency, uncle Niyi Adebayo, so he was able to curtail it a little bit when he left government, we had another successor which was quite different completely. That was when that thing was a bit more pronounced but you cannot blame governor for everything that happen in Ekiti, people thought that was the best way of life not until Dr Fayemi came, Segun Oni came, then you marry Segun Oni and Kayode Fayemi. Then you started seeing a lot of people with intellectuals, people are returning back home, people are taking their positions and from there a lot of things happen so, that was how the transition happen but today we thank God. From the first thing i said was Dr Kayode Fayemi’s term we have witness relative peace, of course there may not be money flying around as usual because he is always thinking about tomorrow not today and you realise that a lot of people, those that you have not seen for long time that you went to school with who are now doctors don’t get me wrong, education is not the only way of life, but you see a lot of good people coming bavk and that’s one of the reason why someone like us were thinking that it was good for us to do one or two things there and it created a lot of enabling environment. That is why I say we can associate ourselves very well with Dr Kayode Fayemi policies and yes, I am proud of that.
Q: The internal crises in the leadership of APC, EKiti inclusive is flattering the interest of its leaders and members, do you think this won’t affect the party in future election?
Barrister Ogunmiloyo: There is no party that there is no internal crisis. Look at the other party, what is even happening in other party is much more than the one in APC because in Nigeria, the leadership determine what happens and in a situation where you don’t have a good leader, anything goes. Its very easy to curtail what is happening in APC, it is normal for people to ask for one thing or the other and its all about negotiation and I can assure you as time goes on by virtue of my relationship with the Director of the Organising Secretary because at the present, they don’t have organising secretary but one of my very close friends that I see everyday sits here because he is a very tall man and that is Prof Mustapha, so I am always with him, he always brief me what is happening, all this things will come to pass. so now they are starting the registration and with the registration the next agenda is how to resolve the issues.
Q: Do you foresee any third force or emergence of any political party due to the situation of both APC and PDP leadership drive for Nigerians?
Barr. Ogunmiloyo: Yes, I will now flash you back to the third force that happened in Jonathan’s time, when you look at the time when it happened, I know the people in politics, they too are very smart and you can see a lot of appealing going left and right before you realise next year is 2022 and mind you election is in February 2023 or there about so a year is very difficult for them to prepare a third force, yeah they might make a bit of impact, but it will not be significant and all what we are talking about is interest and I can assure you that a lot of people will be accommodated and that will be the end of the matter and what is even the problem right now, if you want to think deep, the problem right now is not even a problem. The problem we have is normal in both parties, but one is bigger than the other. They still have a leader in APC. Look at the issue of PDP, I’m talking in a general sense now. Secondus, some people don’t have confidence in him, that’s the party chairman, some governors are adamant that he must go. Look at south west, no leader, this one will say you can’t come and talk in my domain, but in south west in APC, there is no issue at all, the only problem is what is going to happen in 2023 and it will come to pass.
Your message to Governor Kayode Fayemi and the good people of Ekiti State?
He is my Egbon now, my message is , I want people to think deep and make a very wise decision which everybody are entitled to whether it is wise or not, but its time that we move forward, its time that we test a younger generation which cut across old and young, who we can send to elders, who is ready to listen to elders, who is very presentable, well educated, who talks less, who is very smart (laughs) let me just say this, he doesn’t even know that I know most of these things about him.
- Thank you very much!