After serving as deputy and completing Oluwarotimi Akeredolu’s term as governor after the latter’s passing in December 2023, Lucky Aiyedatiwa was sworn in on February 24, 2025, as the seventh governor of Ondo for the next four years.
The new governor brings these privileges and experiences to the table. Consequently, he comes to power on the platform of strength. He must speedily erect the right governance bricks to take the state to the next level.
Aiyedatiwa has a robust enabling template. He has no reason not to perform. He has the privilege of people’s trust, having cleared all the 18 LGAs in the governorship election, a feat unprecedented in the history of the Sunshine State. His success at the polls puts a huge responsibility on him.
The new governor enjoys the privilege of continuity. It is the first time power will transit within a political party since the creation of the state in February 1976. Between Akeredolu and Aiyedatiwa, Ondo has witnessed eight years of relative socio-economic development premised on the JMPPR agenda during the first tenure and renewed as the REDEEMED Agenda during the second tenure.
Aiyedatiwa renewed the manifesto and christened it OUR EASE with a seven-pillar agenda. The REDEEMED and the OUR EASE agenda are the same but different in mantra, signalling continuity. The legacy remains but needs to be sustained and guarded jealously. However, Aiyedatiwa must carve his niche within the legacy to keep governance afloat.
The Akeredolu government he succeeded was noted for championing the establishment of the South-West Security Network, otherwise known as Amotekun, in the region against all odds.
Amotekun provides security to the state and the South-West. Akeredolu championed true federalism as the Chairman of the South-West Governors’ Forum and delivered equitable infrastructure. Chief among them is the provision of roads.
As his former deputy, Aiyedatiwa should muster the political will to sustain these achievements.
The new governor must bring fresh perspectives and innovation to improve and sustain service delivery. He must carve his niche by prioritising the massive provision of people-oriented and socioeconomic policies, especially education, power and affordable energy, digital economy, and technology and industrialisation that will make Ondo an economic and industrial hub.
Aiyedatiwa should unveil a road map that will deepen the collaboration with foreign partners to open investment opportunities by tapping enormous mineral and energy resources, including oil, bitumen, mining, and rubber.
While providing an enabling environment for business, he should outsource the state’s moribund companies, including the Oluwa Glass, Ifon Ceramics, and Arigidi Akoko Tomato Factory, as the state did with the Okitipupa Oil Palm Mills and Premium Cocoa Products, Ile-Oluji. He must radically engage in sustained and improved IGR.
Aiyedatiwa should work hard to achieve the OUR EASE mandate. Delivering on the agenda requires political will and the ability to assemble the right hands for optimum performance.
The governor should assemble his cabinet based on competence, not political considerations.
Management of adversity is critical. As the fortunes of the state progressively improve, Aiyedatiwa must skew the budgetary allocation in favour of capital expenditure and huge economic development on an equitable basis and prepare for the rainy day.
He should commit Ondo’s improved allocation to enhance agriculture, education, health, entrepreneurship, and job creation. The All Progressives Congress governor should provide an enabling environment for ease of doing business, encourage entrepreneurship and entrench youth empowerment.
With this in place, he would take Ondo out of the comity of states relying on handouts from Abuja and put it on a sustainable economic trajectory.
With the advantages of a robust template, people’s trust, and improved income, Aiyedatiwa has no excuse not to deliver. He must hit the ground running and deliver governance galaxies to the Sunshine State.
The Punch
