Oyetola Did Not Convert Osun Job Center To A Campaign Office – Ex-Lawmaker

The administration of former governor Adegboyega Oyetola now Minister of Marine and Blue Economy did not convert the Osun Job Center to a political/campaign office.

According to an ex-lawmaker in the state, Hon. Bosun Oyintiloye, only a fractional part of the Job Centre was used to engage people on government policies when he was the Special Adviser on Civic Engagement to former governor Oyetola, while the whole building was occupied by the Ministry of Human Resources and Capacity building.

Oyintiloye was reacting to a statement credited the Osun State Government, through the Commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, Kolapo Alimi, that his former principal converted the center to a campaign office.

Alimi had also stated that those working at the center were mostly political activists and contract staff who were engaged without compliance with public service regulations, hence, it owed them no salary obligations nor withheld their payments, and that the few civil servants within the office were redeployed.

OSUN DEFENDER had last Friday exclusively reported that the job centre located opposite Ayegbaju International Market, Osogbo, was inactive for 10 months before it was put under lock and key in October, 2023, while staffers of the facility claim to be owed salaries for over 12 months.

The former lawmaker stated that, “For the record, I was a former Chairman House of Assembly Committee on Information and Strategy before I was later appointed as the pioneer head and Special Adviser to the former governor on July 25th 2020 barely two years to expiration of that administration to enlighten, educate and promote all the policies and programme of the government.

“Mr. Alimi as a commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment might not be able to differentiate between Civic Engagement and Political Engagement because of his background as a lawyer. For the sake of clarity, Alimi should note that during the last administration, the ministry is called Ministry of Information and Civic Orientation and not Information and Civic engagement, as erroneously said by Alimi.

“Secondly, my appointment was made on 25th of July 2020 as Special Adviser on Civic Engagement not on political matters and I have my personal office in the Ministry of Information and civic orientation at Abeere and at the same time using fractional part of the Job Center to engage people on government policies, while the whole building was occupied by the Ministry of Human Resources and Capacity building.

“The center is Osun Job Center and not annex of the Ministry of Information and Civic Orientation in the last adminstration and it was never used for campaign ground for Gov. Oyetola. So issue of using the appointment or the usage of a section of the Job Center to placate me must be in the wild imaginary thought of Alimi,” Oyintiloye stressed.