Politics
LAGOS State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu has dismissed any threat of losing his re-election next year to any of the opposition parties, particularly the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP).
The governor, who is the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) made the remark recently on a live television programme, Channels’ Politics.
He said he is the candidate to beat in the election, having garnered experience and delivered dividends of democracy to Lagosians in the last three and half years that he has been on the saddle.
Governor Sanwo-Olu said the electorates should not gamble with any candidate of any political party without experience in governance.
Sanwo-Olu threatened by the PDP candidate, Dr Abdul-Azeez Olajide Adediran, he said there was no threat at all, adding that his performance speaks for him. He said:” If you have an emergency at 3 am, who would you call? Do you call a man that has experience; that has gone through the trenches before; that understands what the issues are and appreciates what are the challenges or do you take a chance with someone that doesn’t know what the issues of governance are?
“This is Lagos with an informed audience. This is not a tea party. We are talking about real governance. We are talking about the governance of more than 20 million Nigerians; an economy that is bigger than the economy of Ghana and Kenya. In itself, it is a country.
“I don’t want to disparage anyone. I have respect for all the candidates that have emerged. Now, on the particular candidate you are talking about, where do we start from? What are his pedigrees? The governance of Lagos should not be by trial and error. We need to hit the ground running from day one. I know the names of all my 65 permanent secretaries and their pedigrees. I have gone through it and I know it.”
Sanwo-Olu added that he has earned the trust of Lagosians for a second term. The governor also said he has resolved the challenge of Apapa gridlock. His words: “I have fixed Apapa gridlock. Even the Nigerian Port Authority (NPA) and all of the major businesses in Apapa have written to me to thank us. The residents have also written to thank us.
“However, we still have trailers on the road because we do not have enough trailer parks and we are building one around Orile. If we have an effective call-up system, you have no business coming to Apapa, except you are needed along that corridor.
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“The trailer parks need to have enough facility in their terminals to take those trailers off the road. So, in terms of the gridlock, we’ve done a whole lot of work there. Part of the problem is to fix the road so that the trailers won’t have to be on the road.”
Sanwo-Olu, who said his government is on top of the security challenges facing the state, said he had done so much to boost that sector. He said: “Security is seen as the bedrock of any good governance because you want to ensure that you save the lives of the people and their properties. This is one of the thrusts of our campaign. So, we didn’t just wake up to it now. We thought of it and made plans for that.
“But to look at the security architecture in Lagos, I was opportune to be the interim chairman of the Security Trustfund in Lagos that was set up in 2008. So, what you see in Lagos outside of the regular police command, our government has been able to strengthen Rapid Response Squad (RRS), which now has about 2,500 personnel. We also have about 600 men in the task force apart from the fact that we also have about two-to-three Mopol formations in Lagos. Lagos also has about 15 Area Commanders and 110 Divisional Police Officers (DPOs).
“What that means is that within that little land space that Lagos possesses, we have the whole security architecture. While the regular police attend to the day-to-day police issues, the men of the RRS respond first to tactical issues. And when it has to do with the direct intervention from the Governor’s Office, then the task force responds.
“In the last three and half years, we have been supporting the entire security outfit in the state. We have given them over 260 vehicles. We have also extended a similar gesture to other security formations like the Nigerian Army, the Nigerian Airforce and the Nigerian Navy, under a programme called OP-MESSA. We started all these from day one. And these have helped to be able to deal with the issues of security when they occur in the state.”
“We are also coming out from the regular security architecture to extend the gesture to other security agencies like the NDLEA, the Civil Defence Corps, the Nigerian Correctional Service, the Nigerian Immigration Service and of course, the Neighbourwood Watch.
“It is the entire tripod that is now activated to confront security challenges in Lagos. Notwithstanding, we are still calling for more collaborations. We are engaging the Community Development Committees (CDCs) and the Community Development Associations (CDAs), most of whom provide intelligence reports.
-The Nation
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Tags: Abdul-Azeez Olajide Adediran APC Babajide Sanwo-Olu PDP
