Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde, has split the Ministry of Information, Culture, and Tourism into two.
In a newsletter, he said the government has identified tourism as one of the major drivers of Oyo State’s economic expansion agenda.
“As you already know, Tourism is one of the sectors that we will be focusing on during this tenure to drive our economy,” Makinde said.
He said: “And so, we will be decoupling the Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism. So, we will have the Ministry of Information headed by one commissioner, while another will head the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
“This means that under Omituntun 2.0, Oyo State will have eighteen and not seventeen commissioners. Some may think that we should be reducing rather than increasing the number of ministries, departments, and agencies at this time in order to reduce the cost of governance.
“But, after due consideration, we believe that the benefits of these adjustments far outweigh the costs, and Oyo State will be the better for it.
“With this, the Commissioner for Culture and Tourism will be better able to oversee the Tourism Board and extract the value trapped in that agency, while the Commissioner for Information will focus on communicating the activities of government to the people through the various channels we have made available.”
He said that having sent the first batch of commissioner nominees to the Oyo State House of Assembly, he knows he now has just about two weeks to send the names of the rest of the nominees and have his cabinet in place.
Makinde disclosed that the government intends to continue using diesel generators to power the street lights before moving them to the tribrid power system.
The Guardian
