My Encounter With Governor Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, By YUSUF Mubaraq Authority

Yesterday, I was at the Council Chamber of the Kwara State Government House, on the invitation of His Excellency, The Executive Governor of Kwara State, Alhaji Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq. I was amongst the selected youths from across Kwara to engage his Excellency on his stewardship of the affairs of our darling State for the past three years.

The session was a critical and cross examination of his administration from the day of inauguration. It was a tedious kind of engagement, taking him more than three hours of critical response to the questions from the teeming Kwara youths. The avenue apprised me the opportunity to see how bright and progressive the youths of Kwara are and the brilliancy laced with eloquent with which the Governor tackled each and every questions asked. He thus demystified every form of unfounded opinion I have of him, and I believed, his performance yesterday won him more admirers and firm believers in his stewardship.

Governance is a 24 hours job. It’s not easy. It takes patriotism to be and doing. He resumed for the meeting immediately he arrived from a long hour working visit to Kwara North, to inspect the first phase of the Gbugbu international market. Which if totally completed would boost the economic viability of Kwara State and mirror us to the larger world. A step towards improved productivity and stemming the tides of the rising poverty, especially amongst the Kwara locale and foreigners alike. Talk more of a visionary leader. Talk Abdulrahman. He’s undoubtedly unbeatable.

The world is going digital. There’s a great paradigm shift all over the world. Not many leaders are able to tap into the opportunities which the new world easily provides. In his response to creating an enabling environment for talents to thrives in Kwara. He took us down his vision of creating the first ever Visual Arts Centre Hub in the North central sub-region. The project, if completed boast of harnessing the untapped potentials of the Kwara Youths and globalised them.

The arts and the media are the new oil of the present age. Its utilisation lies with how critical in thought a leader is. And His Excellency is not lagging behind in this regard. Creating movies is much more than making home videos. With his Visual Hub project, he intend to make Kwara the hub of making world acclaimed musical videos and quality movies. Which would in no small measures attract global acts and Nigerian sensation to the beautiful city of Ilorin for premium patronage. This is a plus to the ever growing capital city of Kwara and a great inputs into our revenue generation. The innovation hub is another landmark vision of this Government. Where coding and tech related project would be carried out.

Ilorin is over populated with unplanned developments. The previous administrations made no plans to control the development and put in place a critical measure of evaluation and land usage. In his response to the Ilorin master plan. Kwara last had a Government legislated master plan way back 1967. 55 years ago. Many junks development had sprang up over the years with no proper erosion control and sewage system.

A visionary leader plan for the future as much as he caters for the present. His vision to have Ilorin expanded eastward with minimum traffic regulations birthed the construction of the Tanke flyover. The flyover if completed, would ease vehicular movement along the axis and open up the new sites around the area for proper development in line with the newly legislated Ilorin master plan thereby creating an entire new city with just a single project. Talk of a visionary leader. Talk Abdulrahman.

Kwara was at the brink of total collapse when this administration came on board. Practically nothing was working. The States higher institutions were on strike with backlogs of unpaid salaries and in some cases, revitalization. In the basic schools that was equally the sorry case, most especially in Kwara North. These were the obtainable reality in Kwara then. So pathetic.

Upon assumption of office, his first priority was the educational sector. He cleared the backlogs of salaries and arrears. And most most recently, approved the minimum wage for the Kwara civil servants. Today, Kwara is one of the few States that owe no single salary. That’s a complete departure from the obtainable reality of the yesteryears. The move further improved the education’s output in Kwara and our students are doing exceedingly well because an happy teacher is taking them in class. What a brilliant move of an extraordinary Governor.

Kwaralearn is the new bride and an impetus that would drive the Educational system of Kwara to a global height. With the introduction of Kwaralearn, the Abdulrahman led administration plans to use technology to improve teaching an learning in the classroom. A project that has been launched in four local Governments already with brilliant responses.

The State broadcast media is another sorry case of the previous administrations. I was boiling with anger when the Governor was reeling out the rot he met in the system. Like, which Government goes into an election with State broadcast media down? The Kwara Herald was run aground. Radio Kwara was down. KwaraTv was not transmitting even for a second.

Today, KwaraTv has taken a new shape with beautiful turn around and state of the art equipments. Same with Radio Kwara. Abdulrahman continue to give us reasons to laugh and be proud as a Kwaran.

You cannot but be spellbound at His Excellency revelation.
If you have an untamed temperament, there’s possibility of cursing the people of the previous administrations for their lack of patriotism and the sorry state they left our darling State.

I would continue my revelations of His Excellency revelations of the previous administrations and his own very achievements in the second phase of this wonderful piece. For now I take a chill. May AA continue to succeed.