PASEDA: A POLITICAL TITAN WITH A BURNING DESIRE

Although he was named “Rotimi” at birth, the family name “Paseda” which means reverse the order or praxis which he has become identified, perhaps the symbol of his political identity is speaking for him. Paseda is set to reverse the existing order or conduct and set things right. This is what he carries into politics and will be answering for him in governance. Paseda hopes to truly answer the true meaning of his name by turning things around. For him, it is about good legacy one shall keep and leave behind in government. When people mention the name “Paseda”, he posits, it must mean something very significant to the people and this can only be achieved when you have the resources and the people to back it up. During the controversial rising debt profile issue in the State, Paseda strongly advised Ogun State House of Assembly Members not to allow any official’s plot to put debts burden on the State, they have the power to do it, but they seem not doing it and allow debts to accumulate.

This shows that they are also culpable and are guilty as well. The Governor or whoever cannot do it without their approval. If he goes ahead, he could be impeached and his action would be termed illegal and detrimental to the state. But alas! Our House of Assembly Members have failed. They have turned themselves to be governor’s toys. Every member of that House of Assembly that has not spoken up and stood up and said No we can’t do it, then they are not worthy of being called people’s representatives and lawmakers. He emphasizes that a man should stand for what he believes in. Paseda declared that if he is opportune to become the Governor of Ogun State, he would want to do free education, good road with basic amenities without incurring debts that would be detrimental to the people. He believes in equity, so he is willing to champion this cause across Ogun State. He doesn’t want the people to suffer unnecessarily because fingers are not equal, and to him, all fingers must be comfortable. You cannot hold one finger and say air must not touch it and plaster it. As for him, he will not because of his interest deprive other of what they deserve, so it has to be justified. Paseda even takes his own home for example as they say charity begins at home.
Paseda exemplifies critical intelligence as one unique weapon of assessing and identifying the people’s he’s to work with in governance. If he becomes the Governor and just be in office, he will not just sit in the office and be sending people on errands but to jump on his feet and ensure a successful achievement of any project that will benefit the people of the state. He detests pretence and for one thing, he could identify a pretender after he has been able to engage such person in discussion for hours. He believes in the “best hands for the job” where someone who is capable of handling a project competently, is being given the government job to handle, not the mediocre. He said, if an APC man is found excellent in the tactics and strategies of governance and is highly considered to be quite reliable, he would send for him to come and be the Commissioner. It’s not about closeness but about who can do the job better. To him, fairness is good in all things and the government business itself, must be handled with fairness. It’s this fairness that makes him see things like that. You cannot bring any unjust thing to him because his sense of precision and accuracy will enable him make a profound judgment. He detests sycophancy and abuse. Paseda cautions anyone who is his fan no to abuse Governor Amosun! He hates hooliganism and makes it clear that it’s only a terrible fool that will make an enemy of Amosun because of him. He queried, “what if the person you make an enemy later turns out to be your helper? Paseda practically makes it known his good relationship with his colleagues in other parties such as Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State who is an APC member; Senator Olalekan Mustapha, a PDP member; Senator Buruji Kashamu, a PDP member and the current Senator representing Ogun East Senatorial District; Otunba Gbenga Daniel, Former Governor Ogun State and a PDP member. One thing Paseda should be credited for is his good human relations and political friendship which he hopes to bring to the fore of governance of Ogun State, should he become the Governor. He hopes to always invite his predecessors such as Otunba Gbenga Daniel and Senator Ibikunle Amosun into a round table discussion and seek their opinion if elected as governor in 2019. He believes these political icons have one or two things to say on the governance of Ogun State, Amosun has many things to say. OGD has many things to contribute too.

Paseda requested people to shun deception, politics of bitterness and embrace dialogue.
As a gubernatorial candidate for UPN, one of the things in the agenda, which pricks his heart, and which he hopes to put right is the debt profile of Ogun State Government, which he alleged, runs to N772 billion to contractors and civil servants. As for him, he is not viewing debt the way other people view it. Every single state or country has debt. Debt is not the issue; the issue is what the money was used for. Even in business, money can be borrowed, states borrow money, US does too but how is it used? In Paseda’s view, it seems people got the priority wrong this is because money should have been borrowed based on the available resources into what will regenerate and pay for itself. He said, “You cannot borrow money and sink it all into infrastructure with the hope that as the industries are coming in, you would get it back by levying taxes on them. One needs to consider the time-factor for project implementation and achieving the set goals. For Paseda, who understands the business principles and tactics, he believes that government business should be run with some measures of intelligence. There is of involvement and there is a place of expectation. Governance is not a thing of exclusivity for the governor or only members of his cabinet but on all the inclusive afar where people love to engage themselves and be fully involved. The people who constitute followership should be prepared to ask their leaders questions, and Governor in particular, is not an exemption. The borrowed money must complement the purpose for which it is intended as well as the available resources. The expectations of the people should then be based on their active involvement. Paseda claims his initial strategy for 2019 would be to concentrate on small impacting projects not financially demanding but would have impacts on the people. He is prepared to clear up the debt. First is debt to the people especially the civil servants in the state, not banks yet, but which would gradually be paid to banks based on proposed plan and agreement on monthly basis. He is not interested in borrowing money and robbing Peter to pay Paul, for execution of projects. If such money is used to pay the debt of the civil servants, you will see a bouncing up of the economy, and there will be regeneration in the state. There are no two ways to it. Once you pump money into the State, the State will regenerate itself. Paseda plans for a state-money-flow system in which the money paid circulated round the State and flows back into the government purse again. He promises to pay the teachers and other civil servants, including individuals as well as companies owed and keep the money within the State. Paseda emphasizes much on the people’s defence as the ultimate responsibility of the representatives and the leaders in government. He questions those at the helms of affairs who couldn’t defend their people. For him, it is a waste for anyone in government to acquire property by deception, for it will fail and fall. People themselves are reminded to go back to history and check it out, those who acquired wealth and properties by negative means are no where to be found. He said, “Get N20 million and sign, do you really think that N20 million will make your children successful or any better? Anything that the N20 million is used for, will honestly fail because the N20 million makes people cry day by day, put them in suffering which even leads to untimely death, perhaps after too much pain or hospitalization which they couldn’t even afford in the first place. “Even if you spend that N20 million you acquired dishonestly on your children’s education, do you think those children will succeed? It’s very scary and it really baffles me and I question myself over and over again, if I eventually find myself in the position of authority will I really get involved in this thing at all? Good name is better than silver and gold.
Paseda hits the nail on its head about the deplorable rural roads in Ogun State. He credited Chief Olusegun Osoba, the then Governor of Ogun State for the giant strides he made as the Executive Governor then. Osoba touched nearly all the rural roads in the State and opened new roads where necessary. He touched the urban roads in nearly all the cities in Ogun State, likewise few of the past leaders. The issue of bad roads was particularly addressed by Paseda and described it as being very terrible, and did not exempt the current Government of Ogun State, whom he said, had left nearly all rural roads undone at the expense of building bridges all over the State. Although, he did not in anyway condemn the infrastructural development in the state, he only said that the concentration on bridges and Abeokuta is too much. On the regional development, Paseda submitted that present government is too biased, concentrating more energies on the central and State capital – Abeokuta.

Abeokuta is far more developed than other geopolitical zones in Ogun State. Ijebu and Yewa in particular suffer this. The Yewa people are in the worst position. He added, when you use infrastructural development to control the people, you think you are winning, it’s not, it’s when you get out of office you will realize you have lost woefully.” Paseda advocates proportional distributions of funds across the Senatorial districts in the state. This should be based on the demographic scale and numbers, in relation to the geographical capacity of the senatorial districts in Ogun State. He advised the State to take a clue from the Federal Government. For example, Ogun state does not get the same allocation like Lagos, so also should this be applied to each Senatorial District. Ogun East, Ogun Central and Ogun West.

He continued to emphasize an all round and a broad spectrum development in Ogun state that behind every development, consideration for the people, citizens that matter, saying though people are the end users of the facilities, their state of living should not be overlooked, they have perceptions and feelings. Most developmental projects have been carried out by Amosun-led government to the detriment of the people who daily complain of lack of money since salaries of workers are not paid and this has spurred hatred for the Governor in particular. He differentiates between equitable and equal distribution of resources, while the former puts resources in relation to population of the people into consideration, the latter is based on the distribution of resources irrespective of population. He therefore posited equitable distribution, people, the citizens of the state must experience fairness. He declared zero-tolerance on governance of tribalism and advocated purposeful governance without tribalism or segregation.

In his bid to empower the youths of Ogun State, Otunba Rotimi Paseda creates avenue for capacity building in relation to skills or merits accruable to youths. As a leader with a burning desire for transformation, he creates a demarcation between empowerment and slavery. To him what integrity of the politicians are doing is not empowerment but slavery. While empowerment builds and sustains the capacity building in relation to skills or merits, slavery is a negation to it and a dehumanization of the highest order. According to him, when you have to give something, it is something that will not make them that thing; that is empowerment. But slavery will make you come back. Paseda claims that the sort of empowerment exercise which he has seen and written other politicians do in Nigeria is mere enslavement. In his analysis, it is wrong to buy ‘Okada’ for a degree holder but instead, such person should be provided the job or given the industrial capacity that suits the qualification. He therefore advises that people should be empowered in the right perspective, not in the wrong perspective. “Establish industries that suit each person according to his profession”, said Paseda.

Otunba Rotimi Paseda cutlines the strategies and tactics he hopes to use in proffering solutions to youth vices as complements of his empowerment activities. He advocates for means to engage the youth, by providing an enabling environment. He makes it known that his cabinet will be donated by the youths. Quite at times he is being accused of excessive trust and involving the youths who are being driven by exuberance and could always be enticed by material wealth but as a man who understand the youths better, he laments on the economic mess and the scourge of poverty in the land which have derailed our youths mentally. It’s a pity that the situation in the country have put Nigerian youths in this kind of existential depravity. While comparing the situation in abroad and that of Nigeria together, the political legend sees both in the opposite direction. Youths in abroad are fantastically paid and their government made a very good provision for them, so there is so place for bribe. As part of the activities to fully engage, youths in Ogun State, Paseda enumerates several measures among which is sending youths technological based countries. His opinion is that those youths who are well technologically gifted could be sent to South Korea for training and greater capacity building, knowledge which they can bring back to the state and help develop it. Not only that, he emphases it that loan will be provided which he believes they will turn around into industries wealth in no time. As a Governor you have the power to assist without spending. The Governor identifies the problems of civil servants in the state to be lack of accommodation and such civil servants are approaching retirement and you know of a company you can approach, you can conveniently place them on mortgage, not necessarily for profit reasons. The question is, as a Governor, what do you need profit for? Queried Paseda with compassion. Paseda talks about budgeting inclusion, input and no return. On industrial development, he states it that he will turn Ogun State into the capital of all industries, producing items that are imported into the country where youths in Ogun State will be given a first priority.
Since 2015, despite the fact that he singlehandedly funded the party Ogun State and sponsored himself and host the election, Paseda never quit the race and is not going to. But instead has got himself involved in humanitarian services to build a good legacy for the UPN in Ogun State and water the ground for him. He believes that government can’t do it all so he throws the responsibility on himself on the notion that a lot of people need help but they don’t get what they need due to lack of accessibility, and would rather provide the relevant assistance. Stressing his will for foundation and every other comfortable thing needed, he guarantees better services for the people. He just has to go into humanitarian services because it is necessary. But Paseda himself doesn’t run the foundation. There are people he has rightly positioned to do the day to day running of the foundation, all he just does is to chair the activities of the foundation and give him the report.

In fact, they make their decisions themselves. All Paseda does is to fund it and double-check to make sure the funds are not diversified into something else. However despite the humanitarian services being provided, a lot attribute the goals to be political strategy but if one considers the way it is being run, it surprises the people. The projects being executed speak for themselves as the beneficiaries are the ones making the noise themselves. He desist not because he want people to talk about him. To Paseda, when God blesses you, it’s not for yourself alone but because of many people. Among many things that the foundation has done are education projects such as free school coaching, giving of free exercise books, paying of lesson fees despite the harsh economic situation. Over 10,000 beneficiaries have been so far counted. The next phase of the project in heath and this is about unfolding and will either take place before or after the election but it will be publicised so that so many people will have access to it across the state. The foundation is scheduled and planned to be a life-time project and it is registered. It is in Nigeria, it is also in abroad.

Paseda has no regret. At this stage, if he does anything and shows signs as regret then he is not a man, neither is he a strongwilled politician. He could only regret what he does when he was in his teens, not now when he can take a full responsibility for himself. He is over 50, so no regret, rather he is determined. There are two results in life pass or failure, victory or loss. Despite the past failure or loss of the gubernatorial seat, especially that of 2015, Paseda believes he is winning come 2019, perhaps the only resolution that surrounds his heart or faith and he is doing everything strategically yet in the right direction to achieve it. Paseda is UPN’s choice. It is not a matter whether he deserves it or not but a response to the clarion call by well meaning Ogun State indigenes and party stake holders who thought he will serve and best represent UPN as its flag bearer in the 2019 gubernatorial election. This clarion call to his surprise, endorsed and re-endorsed by all the local government chapters of the party at the state meeting. There is no honour that could be greater than this by these well meaning party members and leaders, and one again, as the UPN gubernatorial flag bearer for Ogun State in 2019, Paseda will do the party proud again and take it to the next point of victory in achieving the collective liberation and needed by the people from the scourge of poverty and mis-governance.
Paseda’s hope for the party still stands party of the strategies on ground which are still the party’s cardinal programmes will no-doubt form the bulk of the campaign and he is vocally prepared to pump money into the media: Free-Education at all levels, Free health services for all, gainful employment, rural integration and development. But the media strategies on ground will not be made known for now until then. There is no election campaign without the media but media has so many dimensions to itself; the online, electronics and the print aspect.

Paseda made prediction and estimation that the Governor of Ogun State 2019, will win by less than 50,000 votes. The last election was won by less than three hundred and something thousand votes. But he appears quite pessimistic on certain points stating that the players that are ready are more, and the players have that political parties to loose are the political parties that are ready for them, even if it’s a small political party. Taking Ogun State for example, especially Ijebu-Remo, Paseda gives these calculations: Take Lekan Mustapha, Paseda, Ladi Adebutu, Jimi Lawal, Bimbo Ashiru , Muyiwa Oladipo, if any other person now comes in from Accord, automatically Ijebu votes is divided into five and the above mentioned are PDP, UPN, APC etc even, if the votes will be bought, every candidate mentioned, would still have their votes. Yewa has more aspirants and more are still coming. Let’s assume the Governor called some that don’t worry, we will compensate you, there are some that will not and I can see about four people coming from Yewa clearly, different political parties and Yewa votes is the least in Ogun State already divided into 4. Now to Ogun Central, where Amosun is coming from, be sure he would surely win because he has performed very well in Abeokuta. He might not be good outside but at home he is good. Anybody that says Amosun is not liked in Egba is deceiving himself. Those that don’t like him are not up to those that like him. I don’t deceive myself.
Otunba Rotimi Paseda however, advised the people of Ogun State to be prepared to ask their public officers questions about service delivery and also use their votes to create a better future for their children. Judging from the present situation in the State, the people of Ogun State have been taken for granted by this government and he thinks the people need to stand up in 2019 and demand for better governance an patriotic leadership to safeguard their future”, he concluded.