OSUN IN PROSPECT:- Head or tail, hard times certainly awaits Osun state. As the political gladiators continue their campaign balustrades ahead of the August 9 gubernatorial election, a cursory look at the financial books of Osun state shows a grim reality.... In the last 4 years of the Governor Aregbesola administration, the Governor has succeeded in wrecking huge financial havoc on the state owing to a stupendous appetite for commercial loans with little structural growth. Aregbesolas govt had gone so deep into the murky waters of spiraling debts that the Nigerian Bankers Council last year blacklisted the state from further borrowing from commercial banks!! Realizing that Osun state had hit an unprecedented debt ceiling, the Osun state govt opted for foreign loans from banks like the Islamic Bank. Now, taking loans is not altogether a bad idea provided the loans are spent on economically viable projects which can repay the loans. This principle is as yet not followed in Osun as one fails to see much capital and economically relevant projects on which the loans would have been spent! August 9 will come, the elections will be contested, won and lost yet the reality on ground may not be different. If Governor Rauf Aregbesola wins the polls, his second term will simply be a time of siddon look as the loans will be gradually paid back to the creditors amidst great financial agony to the state. Conversely if Aregbesola looses, his successor will have a tough battle to fight owing to excruciating loan payment plans. At best, the successor may have to go for DEBT RENEGOTIATION: a very unlikely possibility. Thus, as the elections draw nearer, all contending parties and their candidates ostensibly will be forced to make promises: promises which will invariably be difficult to fulfill!! Those who rely heavily on the govt purse for financial sustenance: chiefly the civil servants and contractors need to brace up for a possibly long DROUGHT....! A lesson is for us all to learn the habit of continuously engaging govts at all levels from their 1st day in office, monitoring their activities and attempting to understand the structure, complexity and functioning of governments. We must attempt to be correctly informed about the policies of the govts we voted in. Meanwhile, Osun needs to pray hard..... 9JA 4 LIFE
Posted on: Tue, 01 Jul 2014 14:54:02 +0000
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