KUDOS TO AKIN JOHNSON FOR HIS BOUNDARY SETTLEMENT COMMITTEE

By Razaq Adedeji Jimoh

THE best of a leadership spirit to show as a responsible man seated as head of government is the swiftness of responsive impulse to any matters of public concern the ears could pick and the eyes could sight. We saw that in the early parts of this President Bola Ahmed Tinubu's administration where many appointments and policies were reversed in direct responses to public outcry. Not a few, including this writer, had ever thought Beta Edu's scandal would ultimately consume her by flushing her out of the body of Federal Executive Council. This was because it had rarely happened in the past successive governments, especially in the life of this republic. Does so the appointment of a barely 21-year old man as Executive Chairman of a Federal Board, least the case of his erroneous appointment of a woman Obedientmaniac, which were instantly reversed at the cry of the public.

In the same vein, a number of policies also encountered similar fate to much that some analysts, especially in the pack of his traducers began to brand him as 'President of policy somersault'.

But it all boils down to the intuitive responsiveness of a leader to rise up to any act of public condemnation that lacks a bearing to his personal policy conviction by which he has defined the direction of his administration. That should tell why the matters of fuel subsidy and forex harmonization could not have qualified for such reversal.

Coming back home to the purpose of this essay, this responsiveness factor in part of quality leadership appears to have been reasserted as a creed of governance by the Executive Chairman of Alimosho Local Government, Hon Ibrahim Akinpelu Johnson, as many have ordinarily concluded about him before now. Whether it came by a mere coincidence or a deliberate response to a recently published story of ambiguity in the territorial boundary of his local council, his recent decision to constitute and inaugurate a “Boundary Committee” was a welcome development to speak of a responsive government. It was in that equal measure he appeared to have opened his arms of embrace to the National Emergency Management Authority (NEMA) to bring relief materials to identified victims of disasters in his area.

These two policy actions may appear small and somewhat insignificant because they are in the realm of unseen side of practical governance sort of. But in their latency, however, they carry the destructive weight of a seething volcano or the risk of wild irreversible atomic fusion when they explode. That is why only those gifted with the right nuances for politics and governance, like Akin Johnson in discuss, would be apt to act proactively for due responsiveness to any alert of their imminence.

Interestingly, the boundary matters as raised in the supposed missive was not even a direct call of his attention to them, even though his Council was a direct subject in recipient nexus. He nevertheless found it to be a governance wisdom to act appropriately To appreciate Akin Johnson’s political maturity in this regard is to know that the Council Chairman, whose appreciation of and responsive action to the issues raised, would rather be infantile obsession with irritant politics of exclusion in the immature belief that power is about coercion of a people to compel their groveling before him. This is even worse to be so early in his administration in which he emerged barely as "accidental" power bearer. This is a subject for another day anyway.

The first part of the two-serial essays tagged “An open letter” to the concerned Council Chairman, apparently known to be holding the short-end of the stick in the demarcation anomaly, had its unspoken theme to be the prospect of danger in wishing away boundary dispute on the will of sibling emotion as applied at incipient. It was the second part that concerned Alimosho LG except that it has never been upped to the phase of clear dispute so far and the reason could not farfetched: the area appears to lack real tangible economic value until the Lagos councils begin to explore the hidden treasure in radio and television revenue source. The areas are in the southern boundary at Abule Odu and the Eastern boundary at Orisunbare.

Ironically, however, the southern part harped upon was said to have a way of hitting back at the ruling party with electoral backlash, which the writer affirmed to be his regular experience at every turn of election cycle.

Entitled Boundary Demarcation Anomaly and the Backlash of Electoral Damage to the Ruling Party in the North of Egbe-Idimu LCDA, it reads in excerpt: “The backlash of this abnormality, outside the count of injustice done to Egbe-Idimu, is the broader electoral liability it has become to the ruling progressives. To state it clearly for fact here, the unresolved boundary issues in this corridor always return to haunt the ruling progressives at every election cycle. This is not any hearsay, but an issue this writer always had to address at every electioneering period”.

The piece continued that “The complaint from the residents of Taiwo Street and Onisemo Close was always how they had been suffering the consequences of this unclear boundary through denial of government’s presence, particularly in rehabilitation of the road. For fact, the Streets have been deemed a no-territory Zone. This was to be so proven to my instant knowledge when the immediate past Chairman of Egbe-Idimu LCDA, Hon Kunle Sanyaolu Olowoopejo, once came to carry out major internal roads’ rehabilitations in the Unity Estate under his direct supervision. See the photo below.

If a cause to address this were to be Akin Johnson’s swift action, it simply tells the mind of a matured and responsive Council Chairman who understands the electoral power of a people and always ready to pioneer their interest. This is not to ignore the fact that his action followed the directives of the State Government’s impulsive action to the publication with a broad based order to all council chairmen to take steps accordingly. But, the umpteenth time, his own swiftness must have been informed with the reality of a Chairman who knows his purpose in office and this fact is easily discernible in his speech to the committee.

Inaugurating the Boundry Committee on Thursday, November 13th, he said his mission for having the committee was to promote "peaceful coexistence” with his neigbhourhood councils. He said boundaries were territorial "definitions" for communities' mutual respect to live in peace and harmony, adding that this can only be achieved through "clear" boundary markings.

In conclusion, he clarified to the committee that his expectation from the members was an outcome which implementations shall "build boundaries that protect, not one that divides; one that defines and not one that destroys; and one that will clarify rather than one that will further confuse".

How else could one describe good governance in action! Kudos to you, Mr. Chairman sir.