Date: 2017-09-16

Permit me to say that no nation will attain the pinnacle of her success without taking into cognizance the provision of basic and social infrastructural facilities for the development of the state. Any serious government must have the best interest of its citizens at heart and work towards making life easy for them.

This is the more reason why the Kwara State Government is working day and night in providing and spreading critical infrastructural facilities to the nooks and crannies of the state in order to achieve overall development. With what we have seen on the ground in terms of completed and on-going projects in the state, I can categorically say that the government is committed to making life easy for all Kwarans.

The governor re-assured Kwarans some weeks back when he visited Omu-Aran in Irepodun Local Government Area of the state while flagging off the reconstructed Olomu-Agan-Oru road that no section of the state will be disadvantaged in the distribution of amenities.

This statement gave credence to the fact that all section of the state has benefitted and will still benefit more in terms of quality projects. It is germane I state clearly that projects that border around health, works and transport, education and human capital development have been evenly distributed and will continue to spread to other parts of the state with the pace at which the government is going.

Through the Infrastructure Development Fund (IF-K), new road projects have commenced across the state. Part of these includes the Geri- Alimi Split Diamond Interchange, which is the first project to be funded by the Kwara State Infrastructure Development Fund (IFK). Other ongoing projects positioned towards the infrastructural development of Kwara State are Share-Oke Ode Road, Anilelerin Road, Offa, and the dualisation of Kulende-UITH-Oke Ose road, Ilorin. More so, under the Ministry of Works and Transportation, the government has completed and rehabilitated 73 and 35 on-going road projects respectively.

Some of these include the construction of Pakata-Sooto-Anifowose market road (Ilorin West), Opomalu-Isale Maliki (Ilorin East), Ayedun-Ilale road (Oke-Ero), Tsaragi market road (Edu), Obbo-Ile Isapa road (Ekiti), Ogere CAC road Babanloma (Ifelodun), Igbesi Street Tanke (Ilorin South) amongst others. The Kwara State Government under the health ministry has completed 49 projects and has six on-going projects.

These include some inherited and newly completed Primary Health Centres (PHC), Kulende PHC (Ilorin East), Oko-Erin PHC (Ilorin West), Malete PHC (Moro), Sinawu PHC (Baruten) and Arandun PHC in Irepodun Local Government Area. As if that is not enough, the government also Rehabilitated General Hospitals in Ilorin, Share, Omu-Aran, Kaima and Offa; not to talk of consultancy services, procurement, and installation of various quality health facilities spread across the state hospitals and primary health centres.

This write up will not be complete if I fail to talk about the work of the government under the ministry of education and human capital development. The International Vocational Training and Entrepreneurship College, popularly known as IV-TEC situated in Ajase-Ipo is an initiative of the government run as a non-governmental organisation to serve all Kwarans interested in acquiring quality technical skills. Also, rehabilitation exercise has been completed in various parts of the state and one is ongoing at Government Secondary School, GSS, Agbamu.

It is important I digress a bit to the agriculture sector, the Off-takers Demand Driven Agricultural Scheme (ODDA) is one of the major projects launched by this administration to empower rural farmers, create employment opportunities, promote commercial farming, and boost food production and security. Under the scheme, over 1,000 farmers have been empowered and settled on Estate Farms that span 2,500 hectares across the 16 Local Government Areas in the state.

Certainly, it is no gain saying that the Kwara State Governor, AbdulFatah Ahmed, has justified his claim that projects will be evenly distributed across the state and that no section of the state will be disadvantaged. I can unequivocally say this administration has done well and will end well with what we have seen and analysed so far.

We should not forget that infrastructure is a key component of sustainable development and we can see that the Kwara State Government is sparing no effort in bridging identified gaps for economic growth of the state.