Godwin Obaseki Talks Tough On Edo Local Government Election

<p><em>Godwin Obaseki&comma; Edo State Governor&comma; is talking tough in the forthcoming local government election in the state<&sol;em><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">OpenLife Nigeria<&sol;a><&sol;strong> reports that the Edo State Governor&comma; Mr&period; Godwin Obaseki&comma; on Tuesday reassured that only competent persons with character and proven integrity would be elected as chairmen and councilors in the forthcoming local government election in the state&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The governor&comma; who promised not to allow godfatherism to thrive again in the state&comma; stressed that the country’s electoral process strongly affects the system of governance&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Godwin Obaseki said this when he declared open a one-day workshop on &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Igniting the Economic Development and Viability of Local Government Areas in Edo&comma;” held at the Staff Training Centre&comma; Benin City&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>According to the governor&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;The process of elections itself affects the nature of governance&semi; the way I have been elected is definitely going to affect the way we are going to govern Edo&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>He continued&colon; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;I realized that the reason people voted for us as a government is because of hope&semi; given the track record we had&comma; they felt that if we are allowed to continue&comma; we will do more for them&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;The parents of almost 300&comma;000 children that we have in our basic school system know that they will lose something if we lost the election&semi; they knew that if there was a change in government there will be no more Edo Basic Education Sector Transformation &lpar;EDO-BEST&rpar; programme&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;So&comma; they came out because they had a stake&period; As <strong><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">governor&comma;<&sol;a><&sol;strong> I have no choice but to continue with the EdoBEST programme and improve on it&comma; which was one of the reasons I was given an opportunity to serve&period; It was not one godfather that made it happen&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;I am not beholden to godfathers but to Edo people&period; That is the same thing we must do with the local government elections&semi; it has to be the people that are sending you there&comma;” he added&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Godwin Obaseki further noted&colon; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;When you get there&comma; your first obligation is to serve the people&comma; not any godfather&semi; once they realize that you are serving them&comma; even when you don&&num;8217&semi;t have all the resources&comma; they are more sympathetic&semi; they will trust and believe you and continue to support you&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;The local government doesn’t have enough but with the little available&comma; we have been able to convince them that we are using it for their own good&period; The local government is the first point of interaction with the government and democracy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;The level of corruption in our system doesn&&num;8217&semi;t allow us to work as we should&semi; let us tell ourselves the truth&period; Lobbying for contracts when you are not a contractor further spreads the funds meant for projects execution into the wrong hands&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We have to fix things up&comma; as nobody is going to help us fix it&semi; the good thing is that we can fix it&period; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">Godfatherism<&sol;a> would not be allowed in the forthcoming local government election in the state&comma; as only people with proven integrity would be elected as chairman and councilors in our local government&comma;” Obaseki added&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>On his part&comma; the guest speaker&comma; Mr&period; Igbinidu Inneh&comma; said that it was important to review the sources of Internally Generated Revenue <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;openlife&period;ng&sol;">&lpar;IGR&rpar;<&sol;a> from the local governments to make it more viable to meet the needs of the people&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We need to invest in data gathering because without data you don&&num;8217&semi;t have information that will translate to increase revenues&period; We should also aggregate small businesses at the local government level so that we can unlock the potentials in them and create better access to the market&comma;” he added&period;<br &sol;>&NewLine;Governor Godwin Obaseki won a renewed mandate on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party&comma; PDP&comma; to govern Edo in the next four years on September 19&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;