I have followed the new round of comments on the Sulu Gambari Pavilion, a project facilitated by Senator Saliu Mustapha through the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security. Expectedly, they were the usual talks laced with subtle blackmail. None of them interrogated the key issues nor cared about any due process. It’s the strategy of the usual suspects.
It is painful and unfair that these whole things look like those behind these commentaries simply want to drag us back to the era of anything-goes and anyhowness in Kwara State after Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq has set the pace for sanity and order.
We saw another fine example in the recent recruitment by TESCOM. Fairness and due processes were followed to the letter. The system was allowed to operate freely despite pressures and sentiments from various quarters. This is the new Kwara we’re beginning to witness under Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq.
I don’t pray for Kwara to recede to the era of impunity. It should be gone by now. Everyone, no matter how highly placed or connected, ought to, as a matter of civic duty, follow established protocols, procedures, and processes.
This is especially so in the case of construction. We have read reports of building collapse from various states of the country. Investigations into most of these incidents show that certain protocols and approvals were bypassed. In the wake of the reported collapse, many souls have been lost, dreams killed. We don’t pray for this in Kwara, but it’s not a matter of prayer alone. We must do the right thing at all times, irrespective of the interests involved.
The introduction of emotive slants into what ought to be professionally carried out is most condemnable.
I hope some of the clerics and stakeholders who appeared to have been contacted to weigh in on it are mindful of their inadvertent charge to the government to stamp laws and order in the face in support of their favourite person. Is that what the ordinary people deserve?
The public will begin to take note accordingly.
The blame, whether we like it or not, is all on the ‘contractor’ and by extension the Office of Senator Saliu Mustapha. Afterwards, the public display of members of the senator’s team and his followers show they are more concerned about politics than development. Some of these incompetent minders of him messed the whole situation mobilising disguised attacks on the Governor and his administration, when they should be looking for strategies to remedy the situation without delay. By now, they should have got the memo that blackmail hardly works on Governor AbdulRazaq. He will always support what is right and lawful.
And no, Ilorin Emirate is not on the verge of missing Durbar by any chance with or without the construction of the pavilion. It is another bad propaganda, one to set the people particularly against the government. While it may, indeed, add colour, we have always held the cultural event with pomp and pageantry within the forecourt of the Palace without hassles. It has caught greater national attention in particular in the last three years. It is under no risk of being held or even grandier without the pavilion. Those promoting that narrative needs to be reminded that Ilorin Emirate didn’t start after the 2023 elections.
To be clear, I do not know a single person much less Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, the Chief Kwara Rebuilder, who doesn’t want this development for Ilorin. What patriotic citizens have been saying is that not in spite of the due process and safety. Who puts the cart before the horse?
We did not have to be here. But Senator Mustapha and his team boycotted the state authorities and immediately commenced construction. This is an affront and a disregard for the state authorities. Now, this is not a first. The Senator has times and again bypassed state authorities in project execution. All of the instances were self-admitted. Some say it is a troubling pattern of incompetence and mischief. In a road construction in 2023, they did a similar thing. More recently in a football match involving Kwara United, they chose to relate with unofficial sources.
Patriotic Kwarans who are concerned about development should ask the Office of Senator Saliu Mustapha why his projects and activities always create issues in the polity. After all, we recently had Senator Yahya Oloriegbe in place, which was not the case. It is said that it is because his handlers give preference to the political points, and damn the real impact. And they will always want to use blackmail and raw emotion to cover up for their incompetence. Several federal lawmakers and even public-spirited individuals are executing projects without the back-and-forth typical of the Senator’s camp.
Governor AbdulRazaq has again shown to be a ’dahiri’ on this Sulu Gambari Pavilion. How embarrassing will it be for the emirate for a future government to say the Pavilion sited in the forecourt of the Emir is to be brought down because it didn’t follow due procedures!
The energy should not be to stampede the government; it should be on getting individuals or corporate bodies wanting to erect structures for public use to do the right thing.
The move by KWGIS was the kindest reaction to the initial provocative behaviour of starting a project without application or approval. In Lagos, this could lead to outright cancellation and possible prosecution for breach of laws.
KWGIS, as I learnt, has written back to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, under which the Pavilion is being funded, to seek documents that should have accompanied the belated application for approval because the application was devoid of relevant documents, including site analysis, fire safety plan, sewage system, environmental management plan, parking lots plan, and the EIA, among other requirements. Can you imagine? This is the standard expected and it is known to all in the industry.
The right thing should always be done, as Kwara cannot afford to recede to the era of impunity and anything-goes!
•Abdullateef is Senior Special Assistant on Communication to Kwara Governor
