When Governor Usman Ahmed Ododo assumed the mantle of leadership of our great state, ‘The Confluence State on 27th January, 2024, he came in with the mission of offering services for collective interest as occasioned by the peculiarity of the state’s socio-political and economic environment.
Principled and guided by matching words and actions, Governor Ododo started an open and responsive government by exhibiting the principles of fairness, social justice and equity, transparency and the guarantee of efficiency and good governance.
It is amazing how time flies. As the seconds tick continually, minutes drag into hours, the administration of Governor Usman Ahmed Ododo grows older and older. It is now ONE HUNDRED DAYS old.
Interestingly, the government of Ododo remains irrevocably on its original course towards providing best services to its people. It is still very young but then it has started fulfilling its avowed obligations of fostering a healthier, wealthier, freer dynamic and resilient society better-off than it was before its advent.
Alhaji Usman Ahmed Ododo and his team of able lieutenants have remarkably started well in their quest to transform Kogi State into the top twelve most developed states in the federation before the end of their first tenure.
That was made possible by encouraging both elected and appointed officials to appreciate their exalted positions as a trust, a privilege and a honour from the people to serve them creditably well.
Ododo has similarly made effort by making the citizens to be sufficiently mobilized and radicalized to understand that it was right and natural to demand quality services from those in leadership positions.
In that way the Governor Ododo’s social contract or policies for the people is that it is formed and transformed into a comprehensive blue-print for the alteration of Kogi State into a veritable workshop for socio-political works that will hasten the reaping of democratic dividends.
In a short span of time and effortlessly too, security for peace and development are currently flourishing and a new era is setting in to bring about fast development in the state.
Governor Ododo is now doing so much on how to intensify agricultural development ostensibly to foster poverty reduction, hunger and insecurity.
He is also working hard to ensure that the teeming youth and womenfolk in the state are motivated and economically empowered with particular emphasis on infrastructural development.
Ododo’s leadership in Kogi State is just one hundred days old, and the governor is using all the resources available to him to address various challenges he met on ground such as insecurity, ethnic mistrust among various ethnic groups in the state, low morale among workers and pensioners, poor and lack of infrastructure and many more.
Governor Ododo has taken his time to study all the above challenges in order to put things in the right perspective.
As a silence achiever, he rolled off the sleeve of his shirt and hit the ground running.
He first of all demanded for loyalty and support from Kogites and promised to promote cohesion amongst the various ethnic groups, He visited prominent traditional rulers and opinion leaders within and outside Kogi State to join him to restore confidence to the people of the state.
He also visited President Bola Tinubu GCFR in both Abuja and Lagos to brief the president on the security situation in the state and he solicited for presidential support in his quest to provide adequate security for the state.
Governor Ododo ordered all the 21 local government caretaker chairmen to fully take charge of the security situation in their respective locations. Recently, he provided one hundred patrol vehicles to the local vigilante groups across the state for them to discharge their jobs effectively.
Within the last one hundred days, the administration of Ododo is currently reworking the poor salary and pension being paid to the local government workers and its pensioners. Today, smiles have been restored to the faces of local government workers, primary school teachers and pensioners who for over eight years were paid in percentages, Ododo has restored and renewed their hope by paying one hundred percent salaries to them.
Presently, Ododo has initiated bursary awards to all students of Kogi State origin which may likely materialize in the next few weeks. This will be the first such palliative measure in many years to be given to students in tertiary institutions from the state.
Recently, Governor Ododo approved and ordered the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) to quickly release some relief items to communities affected by banditry or herdsmen attacks and wind storms that visited such communities like Isanlu, Iyara and a community in Omala Local Government Area of the state attacked recently.
The governor few days ago, was mandated by the All Progressives Congress (APC) to conduct the Ondo APC governorship primaries which he conducted very well to the admiration of the National headquarters of the party in Abuja, aspirants and party faithful in the state thereby making us in Kogi State to be proud of this great feat of his.
Conclusively, it may look too early to assess the achievements of Ododo’s administration, as he is busy studying and laying the foundation needed to build a virile Kogi State. Let all hands be on deck in order to move the state to an enviable height.