Date: 2011-04-18

The Kwara State Government is aware of the spurious allegations levied against it by the gubernatorial candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN), Senator Gbemisola Saraki especially with regards to the claim that it spent N690million to finance the National Assembly elections.

Without being immodest, the ACPN’s claim shouldn’t have be taken seriously by any right thinking person because there is no single truth in the "Press Statement" credited to her Director of Media, as the claim was a cocktail of lies and confusion.

The ACPN is already a wounded lion in the State for the defeat it suffered in the National Assembly elections in which the party failed woefully to clinch even a seat be it in the Upper or Lower chamber; what a big shame?

How can the state government commits a whopping sum of N690million tax payers money to finance an election? It is absurd; the claim is baseless and absolute nonsense.

However, we are not surprised that the party is yet to recover from the shock it suffered in the hands of Kwara electorates as it is obvious that ACPN is bound to go into oblivion as soon as the election is over.

Election is a process and it is only logical that ACPN accepts defeat gallantly in the spirit of sportsmanship as there is always another day for election losers since election is not about winning all the time. If the party has been rejected by the people of the state today, tomorrow the table may turn round and so why is the party employing falsehood just to paint the government in bad light?

Perhaps, it is important to inform the ACPN’s gubernatorial candidate that PDP does not need to influence voters’ with money before wining an election. The achievements of the party in the last eight years are enough to mobilize the populace to vote for the party.

On the claim by the party that there is no potable water and that many boreholes have broken down, one cannot but pardons the Senator because she is not in tune with her constituency or knows the level of development in the State.

The State government in collaboration with the Federal Government embarked on the 1.2billion Naira expansion of Asa Dam apart from sinking three boreholes in each of the 193 wards in the State.

The first phase of the project had been completed with reticulation of pipes in the metropolis also completed and that is why water has been flowing everywhere including places that previously had no water supply for almost 20 years.

The PDP-led government of Dr Bukola Saraki has done so much to propel the economy of the State through his Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) initiative programme. This in the view of observers had made the State the economic hub of the country in the North-Central geo-political zone.

Besides, the government also created jobs for youths and the women folks including widows through various poverty eradication schemes, which have improved the economic lives of the citizenry.
 
However, it is not our intention to engage the ACPN’s gubernatorial candidate in a media war but the distinguished Senator is advised to substantiate her claims with proofs if she is sure of her allegation.

The era of politics of deceit is gone for good in the State and would not rear its ugly head again. We challenge the Senator to publish openly what she has used her 12 years in the National Assembly to achieve for the people of her constituency.

Mas’ud Adebimpe
Chief Press Secretary to the Kwara State Governor
18/04/2011