By Governor Ademola Adeleke used Osun State’s 35th anniversary to lay out his Osun development priorities for the new term, promising continued investment in infrastructure, agriculture, education, and rural growth, while also pledging to heal the wounds left by last month’s turbulent governorship election.
Osun Development Priorities Take Centre Stage
In a state broadcast marking the anniversary of Osun’s creation, Adeleke devoted much of his address to the Osun development priorities guiding his new term. He pledged to build on what he described as the administration’s achievements in infrastructure, the digital economy, sports development, agricultural mechanisation, education, and healthcare, framing these sectors as the backbone of the state’s continued growth.
He said youths, women, and students would remain a special focus among the Osun development priorities going forward, alongside a renewed push on industrialisation, workers’ welfare, rural development, and ease of doing business. Wealth creation and anti-poverty initiatives were also named among the priorities shaping the administration’s agenda for the coming years.
Adeleke said his government would continue implementing what he called its renewed five-point agenda within the bounds of due process, procurement regulations, and best practices in project implementation. He added that the administration would further refine its local content model while expanding financial inclusion through cooperative sector financing, both positioned as tools for advancing rural and grassroots development.
A State Marked by Sacrifice
Before turning to those development priorities, Adeleke opened his address by thanking residents for their commitment to Osun’s growth and acknowledging the toll taken by the recent governorship election. He extended sympathy to families who lost loved ones or suffered injuries in the violence surrounding the August 15 poll, insisting their sacrifices would not be in vain.
The governor credited Osun residents with holding firm to democratic principles despite what he described as the worst forms of provocation, noting that for more than two years they had heeded his call to avoid taking the law into their own hands even while enduring violence without retaliating. He said that on election day itself, people turned out in large numbers, voted with courage, and in many cases stayed to defend their ballots at real personal risk.
Adeleke framed the election as the toughest test the state had faced across all 35 years of its existence, arguing that the conduct and outcome of the poll proved Osun remains, in his words, the cradle of the Yoruba race and a people of valour and integrity. He suggested the state’s founding fathers, both living and departed, would take pride in how residents defended democracy through hardship, describing the episode as a defence not just of the vote but of good governance and the rule of law more broadly.
Healing Measures Announced
Looking ahead, Adeleke pledged to heal divisions, unite the state, and run an administration attentive to criticism, describing his government as all-inclusive. He urged residents to remain law-abiding and steer clear of reprisal attacks as the state moved past the election period.
To back that pledge, the governor disclosed that his administration was setting up a Commission of Inquiry into the election violence, which will take memoranda from victims and affected residents to identify the causes of the unrest and recommend ways to prevent a recurrence. Alongside the inquiry, he announced an election victim compensation fund, to be headed by the Speaker of the Osun State House of Assembly, Adewale Egbedun, aimed at cushioning the effects of the violence on those affected.
Adeleke closed by asking residents for continued cooperation in delivering on his Osun development priorities, promising to work harder and pledging never to disappoint the people of Osun State, before wishing residents a happy anniversary and voicing continued support for the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Background
Osun State’s 35th anniversary comes weeks after a bitterly contested and, at times, violent August 15 governorship election that returned Adeleke to office. The vote was preceded by weeks of campaign tension and was followed by reports of reprisal attacks against opposition figures, including APC candidate Bola Oyebamiji’s account of assaults on party members in his hometown of Ikire. Against that backdrop, Adeleke’s newly outlined Osun development priorities, paired with the Commission of Inquiry and compensation fund, mark his administration’s opening moves for the new term.
