By: Idowu Togun
I have read with considerable interest my respected brother Hon. Kehinde Sogunle’s intervention on Ogun State’s development history and the political choices before us as 2027 approaches.
As a former Commissioner for Finance and a member of the economic team that served under Otunba Gbenga Daniel, OGD, his perspective deserves respect.
Indeed, his intervention reminds us of something important: Ogun State has never been short of talent, ideas or ambition.
But 2027 cannot simply be a debate about who designed yesterday’s blueprint.
The more important question is:
Who has a clear and measurable programme for Ogun’s next chapter?
That is where Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola, YAYI, and the ITESIWAJU Agenda deserve serious examination.
DEVELOPMENT MUST BUILD ON DEVELOPMENT
No political party or administration has a monopoly on good ideas.
OGD contributed.
Senator Ibikunle Amosun contributed.
Governor Dapo Abiodun is contributing.
Others before them played their parts.
The responsibility of the next administration should not be to erase what came before it, but to build intelligently upon it.
If a policy works, strengthen it.
If a viable project remains unfinished, complete it.
If circumstances have changed, redesign it.
If something has failed, replace it.
And where new opportunities emerge, pursue them boldly.
That is what continuity should mean:
Not preserving everything, but preserving what works and having the courage to improve what does not.
OGD’S OTHER BLUEPRINT: THE RIGHT PEOPLE
There is an important lesson from the OGD years that should not be overlooked.
A blueprint cannot implement itself.
People implement policies.
Hon. Sogunle himself illustrates that point.
OGD head-hunted capable professionals and assembled a respected economic team. He understood that effective government requires more than political appointments. It requires putting round pegs in round holes.
That principle remains relevant.
A YAYI administration should deliberately identify competent professionals, experienced technocrats, capable public servants and promising young minds and deploy them where their skills can produce results.
And there is already something in YAYI’s record that points in this direction. His aides, political structures and the appointments and opportunities he has facilitated have substantially involved indigenes of Ogun State.
The philosophy should therefore be straightforward:
Find competence. Match talent with responsibility. Set measurable targets. Demand accountability.
Political loyalty may help build a government, but competence must help run it.
EXPERIENCE SHOULD COME HOME
For generations, sons and daughters of Ogun have helped build institutions across Nigeria and beyond.
Experience acquired elsewhere should not become a liability when it is brought home.
It should become an asset.
Senator Adeola’s years of public service have exposed him to legislation, budgeting, taxation, public finance, oversight, constituency development and the workings of government.
The relevant question should therefore not simply be where that experience was acquired.
It should be:
What can that experience now deliver for Ogun State?
That is the test that ultimately matters.
NOT A LAGOS TEMPLATE — AN OGUN MODEL
Much has been made of a supposed “Lagos Template.”
But Ogun does not need to become Lagos.
Our geography, communities and economic structure are different.
Ogun is simultaneously an industrial state, an agricultural state, a border state, an educational centre and a state with significant maritime potential.
Its development strategy must reflect those realities.
What Ogun needs is an Ogun model.
But an Ogun model should not mean refusing to learn from elsewhere.
Good leadership studies what works, adapts useful ideas to local circumstances and improves upon them.
Learning from Lagos, another Nigerian state or even another country does not diminish Ogun’s identity.
It expands Ogun’s possibilities.
WHAT DOES YAYI ACTUALLY PROPOSE?
This is where the 2027 conversation should become specific.
YAYI’s case cannot rest merely on experience or political structure. It must rest on what he proposes to do with the opportunity to govern.
On jobs and youth development, the ITESIWAJU Agenda proposes training 100,000 young people in digital skills by 2031, establishing a Youth Enterprise Hub with satellite centres and pursuing programmes targeting more than 500,000 jobs.
On local government, YAYI has committed to direct allocations to all 20 councils in accordance with the Supreme Court judgment, alongside greater accountability for development at the grassroots.
On transportation, the agenda proposes mass transit across major corridors, commuter rail partnerships connecting Abeokuta, Lagos and industrial areas, and OgunRide to support commercial drivers through vehicle financing, cooperatives and health insurance.
On agriculture, the emphasis is on mechanisation, farmer financing, processing hubs, climate-smart agriculture and agro-industrial parks — moving the state beyond primary production towards value addition.
On healthcare, the proposal is to revitalise the state health insurance system and expand coverage towards two million residents.
On public finance, ITESIWAJU proposes a single-window revenue system, measurable performance targets for government agencies and a stated goal of increasing internally generated revenue by 40 per cent by 2031.
These are specific propositions.
They should be scrutinised.
How much will they cost?
How will they be funded?
What are the timelines?
What should be delivered in the first year?
And how will performance be measured?
A serious agenda should be prepared to answer serious questions.
FROM BLUEPRINT TO ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY
Ogun Waterside provides perhaps the clearest example of how continuity and new thinking can meet.
The vision surrounding Olokola and the maritime potential of Ogun’s coastline did not begin today.
OGD and others who advanced that vision deserve recognition.
But recognition alone will not create jobs.
The next challenge is to build an economy around the emerging maritime opportunity.
How do we connect the coastline to manufacturing, agriculture, logistics and exports?
How do SMEs enter the supply chain?
How do we prepare young people for maritime, technical and industrial employment?
How do host communities become genuine economic participants?
And how do major investments translate into sustainable revenue and wider prosperity?
The objective cannot simply be to build infrastructure.
Infrastructure must create economic activity.
Ports should stimulate industries.
Industries should create businesses.
Businesses should create jobs.
And jobs should strengthen families and communities.
That is the development chain ITESIWAJU must pursue.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT MUST MEAN LOCAL DEVELOPMENT
The same principle applies to local government autonomy.
Autonomy cannot simply mean moving money from one account to another.
It must produce visible development closer to the people.
Better primary healthcare.
Improved community roads.
Functional markets.
Cleaner communities.
Support for agriculture and local businesses.
More responsive councils.
Direct allocation must therefore go together with transparency and accountability.
Otherwise, we risk decentralising money without decentralising development.
THE “SOURCE CODE” BELONGS TO THE PEOPLE
Hon. Sogunle memorably argues that his political tradition possesses the “source code” of Ogun’s development.
I understand the point he seeks to make.
But no political party owns Ogun’s source code.
No administration owns it.
No individual owns it.
It has been written over generations through the contributions of successive governments, civil servants, professionals, entrepreneurs, traditional institutions and communities.
Leadership merely holds it in trust for a season.
Perhaps that is the deeper lesson from the OGD administration itself.
OGD had ideas, but he also recognised that ideas require capable hands.
He went looking for talent.
He assembled a team.
He put people in positions where their expertise could serve the state.
ITESIWAJU should take that principle into a new era — combining experience with fresh talent and matching responsibility with competence.
THE CHOICE BEFORE OGUN
As 2027 approaches, the debate should therefore move beyond who owns yesterday’s blueprint.
The question is what comes next.
YAYI has begun putting an ITESIWAJU programme on the table. Its promises should not be accepted merely because they sound attractive. They should be interrogated, costed and measured against delivery.
The alternatives should be subjected to the same test.
OGD deserves his place in Ogun’s history. So do those who came after him.
But the next chapter cannot be written by nostalgia.
It must be shaped by ideas relevant to today, competent people capable of implementing them and leadership prepared to be held accountable for results.
That is the contest Ogun deserves in 2027.
Let the records speak.
Let the programmes be tested.
Let capacity be demonstrated.
And let the people decide.
The past deserves respect.
The future demands a plan.
IDOWU TOGUN
OCTOBER 2026
