Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Nigeria’s
Edo state is puzzled by the scanty
presence of police patrol vehicles in the
state, even though his government had
bought over 110 vehicles for the police.
He raised the concern at a special
meeting he held with traditional rulers
in the state, and revealed that he had
asked the acting commissioner of police
in the state to present the vehicles for
an audit.
“In Edo we have given out over 110
vehicles for patrol but when I go out I
don’t see them. I have asked the acting
Commissioner of Police to make the
vehicles available for a physical audit.
“We cannot accept a situation where the
vehicles provided for security in the
state are diverted for private use or
even taken outside the state for other
purposes.
“We will need to go beyond throwing
money at the security agencies and find
out how they have managed the ones
we have given to them,’’ he added.
The governor who several months ago
opposed the advocacy for state police,
proposed that the vigilante groups in the
state be armed to tackle security
challenges.
`We have to revisit the issue of the
vigilante groups carrying weapons to
complement the security agencies in our
communities.
He also urged the traditional rulers to
appeal to the Federal authorities to fund
the police adequately.
The meeting with traditional rulers was
also used by the governor to unfold his
plans for the coming year, topmost of
which were a planned security summit
and a town hall meeting on how to get
the Local Government Administration
deliver more dividends of democracy to
the people.
The government blueprint is contained
in a statement signed by Oshiomhole’s
Chief Press Secretary, Mr Peter Okhiria,
on Sunday in Benin.
It quoted the governor as saying that
the construction of the Central Hospital
Benin, which suffered a little setback in
the outgoing year, would be completed
and equipped with modern facilities.
Oshiomhole at the meeting said, “we
need your support to revisit the local
governments to make them work for
the people.
“We have to bring a change to the local
government administration to bring
government closer to the people. In a
democracy, the only thing that is
constant is change, we cannot continue
like this at the local government.
“` We cannot have local governments
that are there to pay salaries alone,” he
noted.
The governor, who expressed dismay
over the activities of the local
governments said among other reforms
to be carried out, was the trimming
down of wasteful expenditure.
He said that funds would be diverted for
capital projects such as the building of
markets in the respective local
governments
“I will seek your support to restore
sanity in our public life. We have to
carry out major reforms across the state
and we will need to be more firm,’’ he
stressed.
On the proposed security summit,
Oshiomhole said that it would involve all
stakeholders in the state.
He said that with the contributions from
the summit, the state government
would be able to deal with the security
challenges in the state reducing them to
the minimal level.
On agriculture, the governor said: “In the
first term of the administration, we
focused on infrastructure, which we are
going to sustain.
“We are now going to focus on
agriculture and the emphasis this time
is to attract businesses into the state.
“We will sustain the current projects
and accelerate the pace of work to the
extent our resources permit.
“We are expecting more investment in
the state that is why we have to
manage our land judiciously and make
the land accessible to genuine investors.


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