Dr. Olusegun Mimiko

Mimiko names running mate, flays Ondo govt. By Julius Alabi, Guardian. 

ONDO State Labour Party (LP) governorship candidate and former Housing and Urban Development Minister, Dr. Olusegun Mimiko, has named his running mate for the April polls, he is Alhaji Alli Olanusi.

Mimiko has also decried the state of affairs in the state just as he kicked off his campaign for the Alagbaka Government House yesterday.

Olanusi, the immediate past chairman of the Ondo State branch of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) according to Mimiko, was chosen because of his sterling qualities.

“I know my weaknesses and I know who possesses that quality, which I believe I don’t have. Alhaji Olanusi can be the rallying point for the elders in the state and he has the track record to shoulder the responsibility of good governance,” he said.

Mimiko also rolled out a 12-point programme, which would bring about rapid economic development of the people of the state.

The LP candidate told journalists at a press conference in Akure, the state capital yesterday, that the new party would not fall to the same circumstances like the ruling (PDP), adding that greed, insincerity and deceit were responsible for the downfall of the PDP in the state.

Mimiko, who kicked off his governorship campaign yesterday at the NUJ Press Centre, noted that he chose his running mate for the fact that he (Olanusi) would be able to cover his area of weaknesses and act as a bridge between the old and the young.

On his 12-point agenda, which he tagged: “A Caring Heart,” he said the programme is meant for positive change in the state, adding that it was designed to solve the prevailing political/economic situation in the state.

The governorship candidate lamented that the resources available to the current administration were perhaps more than all the revenues the state had from 1976 when it was created to 2003 when the incumbent governor assumed office. He, however, expressed sadness that the state had little or nothing to show for it.

“Let me say here that the inability and or refusal of the incumbent state government to take advantage of this largely favourable macro-economic template has created a fundamental disconnect between the government and our people.

“It is in this overall context of palpable and pervasive failure of governance in the face of so much promises that we refer, for want of a better phrase, to Ondo State under the current dispensation, as an inexcusable failure.

“We consider it our responsibility, in the circumstances, to take the relationship between the government and the governed to a new level. For us, mutual trust between the government and the governed is a fundamental condition for good governance”, he added.

His 12-point agenda programme, include agriculture and food security; community-driven city and coastal region renewal and general development initiatives, aggressive capitalisation of land resources, roads and infrastructure; industrialisation, poverty alleviation programme and gender equality and women empowerment.