Recently, a youth and founder of one of the most popular media outfits in Osun State criticized the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro’ for organizing a program with ‘limited appearance’ and ‘secret venue.’
The ‘cocky’ media manager, who has not escaped from threats and arrest plots by the shepherd as alleged, went on to remind the ministry that public funds should not be shared or used to organize events for pockets of individuals.
He stressed that the Ministry should have picked youths as usual rather than asking interested ones to apply via links when they already knew pockets of people they intended to invite.
I used the word ‘cocky’ for the said journalist because he resides in a state where public officials term criticism as hatred, confidence as cockiness, and demand for transparency as arrogance. They probably don’t remember that the profession often requires confidence and assertiveness, which sometimes appear as cockiness.
After I surfed his page, I discovered that he is indeed a ‘friend’ of the Ministry. He is always expressing his dissatisfaction about the Ministry’s ‘super elegant’ events. The other time he complained about the presence of eight aides in the Ministry without impacts but with ‘noisy’ events.
He also encouraged the Ministry to embark on useful engagements and discussions that will drive the young population of the state into prosperity, not their ‘yekebu’ events.
Is it compulsory for the ministry to release communiqués after parties, sorry, events? If he’s not criticizing how old people become beneficiaries under a youth scheme, Imole Corps, he will be asking the shepherd of the ministry to show results in line with his core mandates since he assumed office.
What an arrogant journalist! You are asking a government official to tell us what he has done so far instead of requesting private meetings in a club or bar to drink away his grievances. Who are we? Inconsequential elements of the ministry? It is not compulsory for youths to sit, discuss, and issue a communique. They can eat, drink, and party too. Critics should not frustrate the shepherd.
The other day, a young man jokingly said the shepherd’s shirt, designer shoes, and fashionable glasses are brighter than his prospects for the ministry. These do not matter to me. I am a proud supporter of the shepherd. I don’t care what people say because I don’t want to be arrested.
Do you think it is easy for a whole shepherd in his majesty, fully dressed in well-tailored and starched clothes with fashionable glasses, to sit in a room with an air conditioning system and select qualified old people for the Imole Youth Corps?
Do you think it is easy for a whole shepherd to fight a group in his ministry for 18 months over a leadership tussle? It is not the duty of the shepherd to resolve conflicts. He can add petrol to it. If they burn themselves to ashes, it’s not the shepherd’s business. The one who does not resolve disputes but adds to them is the best.
Do you think it’s easy for a shepherd to gather some young people in the state and hold a march past in front of the Deputy Governor of the state?
These critics owe the shepherd who supervised the recruitment of the Imole Youth Corps in two-dimensional ways commendations, not criticisms. It is not easy for people to apply online and get recruited offline through slots allocated to prominent individuals, not party chieftains. This meritorious achievement, among others, has shown the entire world that the shepherd and his ministry have the ability to work and deliver under any condition.
There was O-calisthenics. It is no more. And there’s no replacement. The shepherd dislikes events or projects that unite. He possibly prefers parties and clubbing. The ministry could not even manage the NANS they installed through bricks and brimstone. The first protest inside the secretariat from the youths against this government was birthed by the inability of the shepherd to manage crisis.
The Osun axis of NANS is also demanding the reconstruction of the terrible Osogbo/Ada/Iree road through protest. They want to protest not because they love Osun State Polytechnic, Iree, students and tutors. They simply want to protest the silent treatment and perceived abandonment from the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro.’
Some quarters posited that the shepherd pays more attention to his dark glasses than to the crisis befalling his ministry. Before social irritants or miscreants descend on me, the shepherd is more active than his predecessors because we have recorded more noise than usual.
His predecessors rarely sparked, but whenever they did so, we saw impactful events or programs like O-calisthenics, O-YES, and State Boys, among others. The current shepherd sparks always, and when they do so, critics claim they see ‘noisy’ events.
I am not a critic of the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro.’ I am satisfied with the alarming, exciting, enticing, and enriching achievements of the ministry because I do not want problems. If you speak against or criticize the said ministry, you’re either cocky, a propagandist, or in the opposition.
Now that critics have angered one out of the eight wonderful SAs in the Ministry, who has promised media onslaught and hate campaigns against them, I hope all critics will gather themselves and head to the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro’ to go and prostrate in front of the shepherd and his flocks. Yes, they should beg for mercy.
The shepherd is using police to intimidate, and one sheep is using hate campaigns and media onslaught to suppress. They should go and beg to save the state from wasting her resources. How can you infuriate our special assistant? If he promises hate campaigns and media onslaught, he’s doing his job.
I pity critics of this ministry. I now understand why people keep quiet. They don’t want to be disrespected or called cocky, propagandist, opposition, or other ‘notable’ names. Can a taxpayer withstand media onslaught and hate campaigns vowed by a tax collector? If you insist that you will keep criticizing the ministry of ‘Agunbaniro,’ go and buy big spoons.
What’s the big deal in using public funds to organize dinner with limited appearances and secret venues? Is the ministry for all Osun citizens? No. Leave our ministry. Leave our shepherd. It is our ministry. It is for us—pockets of individuals in our caucus.
If you applied online and you later discovered that we selected you via offline, it is not new. That’s how the Imole Youth Corps beneficiaries were picked too. Stop disparaging us. It will not be the first time officials would use public funds to organize an event for themselves and their ‘friends’ and sell it to innocent citizens to apply for what they can’t be picked for. This is Nigeria. This is Osun, and it’s normal.
I say hurray to Osun youths. Governor Adeleke gave the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro’ a commissioner and eight special assistants. I do not know any ministry in the state with the highest aides, but where are the results? The governor seems to like numbers of aides more than result-oriented projects.
Is the decision (appointing eight aides in a bubbling ministry) a waste of public resources or an act of political philanthropy? But some appointees did not work for the emergence of the governor, while some criticized the ministry in the early years of this administration.
The greater concern is why is the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro’ populated with aides, yet it’s bombarded with alarming achievements? Probably, Governor Adeleke did not want Osun youths to lose in two ways. They cannot miss coordination and still not get chaos. When there’s chaos, there won’t be time for progress.
Before I write in defense of the Osun Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro,’ I killed a dog. I offered kolanuts, palm oil, palm wine, and roasted yam to Ogun, the god of Iron. I did so to appease the revered god and to soften the hearts of some social media irritants who circle the governor and his shepherd at the ministry of ‘Agunbaniro.’
These individuals, in their struggles for relevance, recognition, and gains, offer advice or engage in activities that bury a message before it’s delivered. Sometimes, they paint messengers as enemies of the state or friends of opposition parties because they know if the message is properly understood, they might lose their nuisance value and patronage might stop.
I therefore appeal to Mr. Governor and his shepherd at the Ministry of ‘Agunbaniro’ to find a compromising position that would accommodate their social irritants and the ‘message’ for the greater good of the state.
A friend argued that I should have also appeased Esu, the short man with big wisdom too. “Esu?” I said. I gave him some funds to appease Esu. I don’t know if he actually did, but I will soon know.
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