Member of the House of Representatives and the preferred candidate of Governor Ibikunle Amosun in next Saturday’s governorship election in Ogun state, Hon. Abdulkabir Adekunle Akinlade  , speaks with Ben Agande on his chances and says, contrary to widely held notion, governor Amosun is not his godfather but only his mentor and leader.

He says he and his deputy are the best among the candidates seeking to be governor of the state because of their experiences, exposure and competences.

•Akinlade

Beyond your endorsement by your governor, Senator Ibikuinle Amosun, what would you say you have to offer that the people should choose you above other candidates?

Endorsement is two ways. You can be endorsed and you can go through primaries. Why endorsement was not done by the Governor but by the people of Ogun West Senatorial Zone. Ten of us came out from Ogun West to aspire to be Governor of the State. Out of these ten over a period of four months, the leaders from the zone sat down and interviewed each of the aspirants from the five local governments and I was unanimously chosen and we all sat down and came out with an agreement that I, Abdulkabir Adekunle Akinade should be the consensus candidate of the APC then. With my emergence as the consensus candidate, I was presented to the chairman of the APC in the State at the Party Secretariat. The party then took me to the Governor as the consensus candidate chosen by Ogun West Elders and Political Leaders.

It is important to note that the entire  aspirant then entered into an agreement that whoever emerged as a candidate, we would all support. it was at this point that the Governor now endorsed me.

We must understand that consensus is in the constitution of the APC. So what the elders of APC in Ogun West did was in line with the constitution of the party and its guidelines. It was a process that led to the Governor accepting and endorsing one.

I believe that in Ogun State, we have rich human and material resources and with the proximity of the State to Lagos and its fame as a gateway to the country, anybody that will be the Governor of the State must have a very clear understanding of these facts. He must have been part of governance in at least, the State level. In 2011, I was the Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Taxation and Revenue. In this capacity, I had the privilege to work very closely with the Governor and the Commissioner for Finance who later became the Minister for Finance in making sure that we harnessed and maximized the opportunities in Ogun State to improve and develop our dear state. If you look around today, Ogun State is the industrial hub of Nigeria. We have invested Billions of Naira in infrastructure. You cannot attract business if you do not develop no matter how rich any area is in natural resource, you must first invest in infrastructure. If you don’t develop infrastructure, it is useless.

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What I want to do is that we will define the infrastructure to spread across the State to attract development. We will develop our communities, our rural areas so as to see more investors coming in. we will invest in infrastructure, we will invest in human capital development in order to attract to Ogun State, investments that will create jobs, and enhance commerce for our people. We will come up with a blueprint that will cover all facets of our programme and we will develop it to the letter.

One of the groups in the state that seems very impressed with your plans for the state is the powerful and influential Sagamites Club. What does this mean to you?

I have had endorsement from many quarters.   My recent meeting with investors who are members of the Sagamite Club was a strategic endorsement by men who have invested heavily in the State. If they believe in your ability and loyalty, you can go home and rest. I

believe that they will spread the message that my candidature is one they can trust and one that can promote investment friendly policies in Ogun State.

You no doubt have formidable opponents. What advantages do you have over them?

Our team is the most qualified, the most experienced in the corporate world, in politics and in governance. We are the only two individuals that have served in the executive and legislature. My deputy served as Managing Director, Chief Executive Officer of Lafarge Cement Company. I am a serving member of the House of Representatives, Chairman of several sub-committees, deputy chairman of the committee on climate change and member of some of the most strategic committees at the National Assembly.

As a team, apart from the fact that we have worked so hard here in Ogun State and have learnt so much over the years, we have advantage over every other team that you have today contesting under any party in the State. This is something that our people should not take for granted because they can rely on and believe that God has put together a team that can deliver and move the State forward.

Despite these assurances, your critics believe that you are tied to the apron string of Governor Ibikunle Amosun. How do you want to reassure these critics that you are your own man?

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I have said in several fora that Governor Amosun is not my Godfather. He is my mentor and I think there is a clear distinction between mentorship and Godfatherism. Godfatherism is where you do not have the capacity to do a job and somebody, because he is in a position; because he wants to push them around gives you the job. What we have here is that I have been tested. I have served under Senator Amosun for four years and he has noted my capacity and can vouch for it. And knowing what I know about him, I want to believe that if I do not have what it takes, he will not stick his neck for me. The danger in picking somebody who does not have the capacity to do a job or does not have a mind of his own is that anybody can push him around. If you think you want to put him there in order to push him around, that means anybody can push him around, you will lose him very fast. But when you have somebody who has character, who is strong willed, you will be sure that he will do what is right.

Knowing who I am and knowing the Governor, we have a relationship of mentorship and not Godfatherism. I want to allay that fear. When we start he will only be in a position of mentoring and support rather than trying to dictate our government for us.

Some people have alleged that those that tried to disrupt the last presidential campaign by President Muhammadu Buhari were your supporters. How do you respond to this?

That cannot be true. It beats logic and reason. First, our members are wholly in support of President Buhari and this was very obvious in the result of the presidential election that was released last week. We cannot be supporting the president on one hand and on the other be disrupting his campaign rally. I think this narrative is being promoted by enemies of Ogun state who tried to cause confusion by imposing unpopular candidates on the people with the hope that the state will be shortchanged. We have gone beyond that and the people of the state are enlightened enough to know those that tried to disrupt the president’s campaign were certainly not our supporters.