Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo has
commended a former Governor of Lagos State and National Leader of the ruling
All Progressives Congress, Bola Tinubu, for the way he constituted his cabinet
in 1999.
Osinbajo said Nigeria’s diversity
ought to be seen as a blessing because “the true wealth of any nation is its
human capital.”
He said having discovered that
diversity was a driver of economic growth and development, countries like the
United States of America and Canada had opened their doors to talented
immigrants from different parts of the world.
The VP said it was also this
understanding that made Tinubu to look beyond Lagos State while constituting
his cabinet as governor in 1999.
He said this decision by Tinubu
was instrumental in the economic prosperity of Lagos State since then.
Osinbajo said this in a lecture
titled, “Promoting national cohesion as a means of promoting progress and
prosperity,” which he delivered on Tuesday as part of events marking the 70th
anniversary of the Lagos Country Club.
Using the Tinubu case as an
example, Osinbajo argued that Nigeria had a lot to benefit from its plurality
and urged the citizens to reject the notion that the country’s diversity was
its problem.
He said, “It is clear that when
we create spaces for migratory talents to flourish without discrimination,
there is an economic multiplier that results in an ever-increasing radius of
growth.
“Perhaps there is a little more
to the prosperity of Lagos. If you look for example, even in contemporary
times, the conscious decision of Bola Tinubu, then governor of Lagos State, to
appoint commissioners from everywhere in Nigeria, in my view, is partly
responsible for the peerless progress that Lagos State has made over the years
from 1999.
“In 1999, he appointed Mr Wale
Edun from Ogun State as finance commissioner; Rauf Aregbesola from Osun as
Commissioner for Works; Fola Arthur-Worrey from Delta State as Commissioner for
Lands; Ben Akhabueze from Anambra State as Commissioner for Budget and
Planning; Lai Mohammed, who was then Chief of Staff, from Kwara State; and I,
from Ogun State, as Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice.
“Of course, he was opposed by
Lagos indigenes, who felt that by virtue of indigeneship they were qualified to
be commissioners and should be appointed and the argument is always valid that
‘why should anybody come from their own state to come and be commissioner in our
own state?’
“But during that period because
the then governor sought for the best talents that he could find, he didn’t
restrict the search to the indigenes of Lagos State, Lagos undertook fiscal,
judicial and environmental reforms that have made the state a model for the
rest of the country.
“If you look at what has
happened, even just looking at fiscal reform alone, today, Lagos State’s IGR is
greater than the combined total of 31 states of Nigeria.
“How did that happen? A fiscal
reform took place because Tinubu took the best minds that he could find. If
that best mind was in Anambra State, Tinubu took it.”
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