Government’s Primary Role is to Provide Security, Welfare for the People – Rauf Aregbesola, former governor of Osun State, says the primary purpose of government is to provide security of lives and property, as well as improve the welfare of the Nigerian people. Section 14 subsection 2b of the Nigerian Constitution (as amended) says the welfare and security of the citizens shall be the primary purpose of the government. I think we should focus more attention on the security aspect. I am of the strong believe that if things goes this way, where the government can’t think properly of expanding her workforce thus providing jobs for the unemployed and idle youths, the security of the nation will be threatened and this is what we are presently experiencing.

The United Nation Children’s Fund has lauded the Osun State Government for enacting the social protection policies of former Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s administration into law. UNICEF Representative in Nigeria, Mohamed Malick Fall, gave the commendation while speaking at the launch of some publications on Aregbesola’s social protection policies in Osogbo, capital of Osun State.

The launch was attended by top personalities, including high calibre politicians, political office holders and legislators from the Osun State House of Assembly, senior government officials and bureaucrats as well as UNICEF representatives.
Hamidou Poufon; UNICEF Chief of Field Officer, Ondo State, Tejinder Sandhu; and the UNICEF Communication Officer, Blessing Ejiofor.

Poufon, who spoke on behalf of the UNICEF Representative in Nigeria, said Osun State has maintained a good lead in the implementation of social protection programmes and promised more support for the state.
He said Osun State has a long-standing record of social development, having outperformed all other states as per the Multidimensional Poverty Ranking report of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative 2018 that ranked it at first place nationwide.

He explained that social protection is increasingly viewed as an important policy component of sustainable development and has become a veritable tool for advancing the development agenda.
He noted that Osun State has maintained a good lead in the implementation of social protection programmes.
He said Social Protection provides support for particular social groups, reduce gender inequality and break intergenerational transmission of poverty if administered appropriately.

According to Poufon, within Nigeria and abroad, several of Osun State’s social protection programmes have attracted attention, more especially the Osun Elementary School Feeding and Health Programme, which is the longest continuously running school feeding programme in Nigeria; and the Osun Youth Empowerment Scheme, which the World Bank subsequently recommended for replication in other states and at the federal level.

He added: “Osun is one of the first states to start the implementation of the federal-level Conditional Cash Transfer scheme and was selected as a pilot state for the World Bank-funded Youth Empowerment and Social Support Operation.

“Given the State of Osun’s record and performance in social safety net investments, social welfare, and social protection, it has become a leading state, continually proving its commitment to enhance residents’ resilience and livelihoods.

UNICEF has collaborated with the state since 2015 in the documentation of the wide array of programmes (at least 21 interventions) implemented despite the economic situation nationwide.
“Other output of the collaboration includes the intra country study tour, which brought representatives of 15 states and the Federal Government to Osogbo in 2017 for a study tour of the programmes that promote social protection, social welfare, economic development and social services.”
“As the state launches the social protection legislation, there is need to pause and reflect on the journey so far; to take stock of what needs to happen in the future.”

Poufon expressed confidence that the efforts will provide the impetus to scale greater heights and reiterated UNICEF’s support and commitment to Osun State for all round development for children and women, as well as the implementation of the social protection policy and legislation.
In his address titled: “From Poverty to Wealth,” Aregbesola said when he decided to contest, he was determined to liberate the people of the state from the shackle of poverty.

The former governor said: “Osun was celebrated nationally of recent. This has to do with the recent United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Nigeria Human Development Report (2016) which revealed that the Incidence of Poverty, which is the percentage of Nigerians who are poor, is 53.7 per cent. The disaggregation of this report shows that the lowest rate of 17.5 per cent was recorded in Osun.”
He noted that the feat was the culmination of all the efforts at providing social welfare for the people of the state.

He explained that since the beginning of his administration on November 27, 2010, he was concerned on the need to reverse the ugly trend of poverty ravaging the people of the State.
He said a total of 60,000 youths were positively engaged under his youth empowerment scheme and that other programmes include the Osun Rural Enterprise and Agriculture Programme, Osun Ambulance Service, Osun Elementary School Feeding and Health Programme, Osun Rehabilitation programme and Agba Osun, the welfare scheme for the elderly citizens.

Aregbesola commended UNICEF for supporting the State to become a model to other states in the implementation of social protection programmes and for the support given to Osun to codify the policy into law.
Policies by the Osun State government to revamp the economy and banish poverty in line with its Six-Point Integral Action Plan has yielded fruits with the latest report of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and verifiable facts from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) placing Osun as the state with lowest poverty incidence in the country.

The Computation of Human Development Indices for the UNDP Nigeria Human Development Report (2016) was released by the NBS and rated Osun the second lowest state in Poverty Index in 2013, one of the five states with lowest unemployment rate by NBS, and the second richest state in Nigeria by the United Nations Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index in 2017.

The New Report places the state’s poverty index at 17.5 per cent, ahead Lagos, Nigeria’s economic capital.
In poverty ranking, it rates Osun State has the least poverty level (0.062) while Sokoto has the highest (0.453), closely followed by Jigawa and Yobe states with (0.399 and 0.385).

The Incidence of Poverty, which is the percentage of poor Nigerians, is 53.7 per cent and the disaggregation by state shows that it is more prevalent (89.9 per cent) in Sokoto, followed by Jigawa with 86.1 per cent, Rivers and Ebonyi states share 58.9 per cent each, while the lowest state is Osun with 17.5 per cent.
Also, the intensity of poverty in Nigeria is 41.9 per cent, which means poor Nigerians are deprived in 41.9 per cent of the dimensions.

It is highest in Sokoto State (50.4 per cent) while Osun State has the lowest (35.5) per cent.
It also puts Osun’s unemployment rate at 6.7 per cent in the federation.

Through effective leadership and good governance, Osun State has been remedied from apparent slide into state fragility and failure. It is one of the states in the country known to be peaceful, owing to the security measures that have been put in place by the administration of Governor Rauf Aregbesola to support security agencies to carry out their responsibilities effectively. The lesson from Osun security strategy is that there is the need to strengthen the effectiveness of the Nigeria Police Force to guarantee security trust in the rural and urban centres and respond to citizens’ security needs. Achieving this requires systemic reforms in the governance and accountability of Nigeria’s police sector. Tackling modern security threats is directly tied to improving the governance and oversight of the security sector, especially the police.

It was evident that Osun has developed comprehensive strategy and home-grown solutions to security challenges in the state by developing a security plan to take care of challenges, such as robbery, cultism, drug abuse and arms proliferation, among others.

The story began to change shortly after the ‘power-shift’ to the hands of Governor Aregbesola, who, as part of his security measures declared that none of his supporters should attack any member of the opposition, who attacked them when they were in power. What then followed was the procurement of five sophisticated Armoured Personnel Carriers and 125 Patrol vans and some other security equipment to combat crimes that already had an established ground in the state. The impact of this was the reduction in the crime rate, particularly in the state capital and some other major towns. This was a feat that had never been recorded by any government in the state. The vans were distributed among all the security agencies, including the Army, Police, Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Nigeria Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Immigration and Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) amongst others.

The state government also subsequently inaugurated a combined quick emergency response team, Swift Action Response Squad (SARS) which comprises security forces like the Army, Police, and NSCDC officials whose activities reduced crime rate to the barest minimum in Osun. The procurement of a French Five-Plus-One passenger Helicopter for Aerial Security Surveillance and presentation of another set of more sophisticated 20 Armoured Personnel Carriers (APC) to the Nigerian Police Force, was a feat that has never been achieved by any government in the state. The procurement of the helicopter and the APC’s has particularly driven away many undesirable elements out of the state.

Osun State is the most peaceful in the country, according to a report on Nigeria Peace Index (NPI). It is closely followed by Kogi and Ekiti States. According to NPI, Kwara and Imo ranked as fourth and fifth respectively in the rating. The inaugural peace index report put together by the Foundation for Peace Professionals, a research organisation that advocates for peace, adopted similar methodology of the Global Peace Index. Key findings of the NPI showed that Osun is the most peaceful state in Nigeria and it has greater tendency for peace based on its overall performance in the five broad indicators. While Osun didn’t come top in any of the five indicators, its overall score is the least violent.

Aregbesola of Osun launched and handed over 20 APCs at the cost of N1.3 billion to the Osun Police command in Osogbo where he declared that when government fails to guarantee safety of lives and property, such government had no business to be in power.

On the heels of concluding two terms as the governor of Osun State, Rauf Aregbesola is getting accolades not from Nigerian institutions or from social media, but from reputable international organizations which includes the World Bank, UNDP, UNICEF and African Development Bank.

The African Development Bank (AfDB) hailed the Aregbesola administration in Osun State for economically developing the state through the implementation of its people-oriented policies and programmes and scored the state high on its social investment programmes.

He was said to have shown creativity, flexibility in human-centric vision of the future of work that recognises people’s knowledge, talents, creativity and skills as key drivers of a prosperous and inclusive economy. UNICEF had led top government officials drawn from 17 states in the six geo-political zones of Nigeria to Osun for a four-day learning tour of its various social investment programmes and building human capital. Consequently, Osun developmental programmes have also impacted on the socio-economic profile of the state as reported by reputable institutions. In 2015, The Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) rated Osun second highest in Human Development Index among the 36 states in the country.

Policies by the government of the State of Osun to revamp the economy and banish poverty, in line with its six point integral action plan, is yielding fruits with the latest report of the United Nations Development Programme. UNDP, with verifiable facts from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), placing Osun as the state with lowest poverty rate.

The World Bank also commended his government over the execution of projects of Osun Rural Access & Mobility Project which are World Bank and French Development Agency assisted Projects.

Indeed, history will remember Aregbesola for four major developments in Nigeria; school feeding programme, sukuk bond for national development, the first governor to embrace fourth industrial revolution and Nigerian chocolate company. Aregbesola worked hard to introduce sukuk fund for education in Nigeria. Osun took the initiative and helped in introducing it to Nigeria. The greatest lesson is that when Governor Aregbesola adopted Sukuk, an Islamic bond to help the state execute educational projects, his critics were calling for his head. Many said it was part of his ploy to Islamize Osun.

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Inwalomhe Donald, writes from Benin City, [email protected]