DEPUTY governor of Osun State, Mrs Titi Laoye Tomori, has described basic education as a critical stage in the overall educational development of Nigeria.
She made this statement in Osogbo, during a courtesy visit by Dr Tunde Adekola, a representative of the World Bank.
She disclosed that the Osun Elementary School Feeding and Health Programme (O’MEALS) were designed to prepare pupils in elementary schools for mental and physical alertness. This, according to her, would enable them to compete favourably anywhere in the world.
Tomori informed the World Bank representative that appropriate actions and plans had already been put in place to ensure pupils in the basic education stage received instructions in Yoruba Language, for the purpose of understanding and easy assimilation.
The deputy governor, who doubles as the state’s Commissioner for Education, emphasised the commitment of her administration to the development, advancement and re-positioning of the education sector for the benefit and overall interest of the state.
Tomori admitted that the collaboration with the World Bank would facilitate the noble objective of the government at both basic and post basic sectors.
In his address, Dr Tunde Adekola  congratulated Governor Rauf Aregbesola  on his re-election for a second term in office, just as he informed the deputy governor that the bank would support basic education in Osun, through the  provision of  financial intervention to the government, in the area of training, re-training and re-orientation of teachers, provision of ICT to schools and educational instructional materials  executed in the cases of Ekiti and Lagos states, respectively.
TRIBUNE

The Osun State Election Petition Tribunal could not sit yesterday as one of its members fell ill.
The attorneys were already seated when the court clerk announced that the tribunal would no longer sit as a member of the panel was ill.
The tribunal, at its last sitting, had fixed yesterday to rule on an application by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its governorship candidate, Senator Iyiola Omisore.
But the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its candidate, Governor Rauf Aregbesola, argued that the objection must be heard at the pre-hearing stage in accordance with the law.
Aregbesola’s counsel Akin Olujinmi (SAN) said yesterday that the petition against the August 9 governorship election would not scale through the pre-hearing stage if the preliminary objections were taken.
He was reacting to the comment of the PDP’s deputy governorship candidate, Adejare Bello, who said his party would go as far as the Supreme Court.
In an interview with reporters, Bello said it was only the Supreme Court that had the final say on whether or not Aregbesola won the election.
Olunjinmi said Bello’s comment has shown that the petitioners knew the weakness of their petition.
He said: “Saying that they want to go to Supreme Court shows that they know the weakness of their case, because I expect them to say at the beginning that they are very sure of their case.
“That would be decided at the hearing, if we go to hearing, because if the objections are taken, I do not see the petition seeing the light of the day and that is why they are afraid of having the objections taken now.”
THE NATION

Photos of the First Lady State of Osun, Alhaja Sherifat Aregbesola, Governor Rauf Aregbesola, Former Governor State of Osun, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Speaker, Federal House of Representative, Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, and others during the Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola, at Eko Hotel Lagos State on Sunday 2/11/2014.

Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; his wife,
Sherifat (right); Speaker, Federal House of Representative , Hon.
Aminu Tambuwal (left) and All
Progressive Congress (APC) Chieftain, Alhaji Kawu Baraje (2nd left), during
the Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola at Eko Hotel Lagos State
on Sunday 2/11/2014.

Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; his wife; Sherifat
(right); Former Governor State of Osun, Prince Olagunsoye
Oyinlola(left) and Publisher/Editor-in-Chief The Gazelle news Online,
Mr. Musbau
Rasaq (behind), during the Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola, at Eko
Hotel Lagos State on Sunday 2/11/2014.

From right –* First Lady State of Osun, Alhaja Sherifat Aregbesola,
Governor Rauf Aregbesola, Former Governor State of Osun, Prince
Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Speaker, Federal House of Representative, Hon.
Aminu Tambuwal, during the Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola, at Eko
Hotel Lagos State on Sunday 2/11/2014.

From right – *All Progressive Congress (APC) Chieftain, Alhaji Kawu
Baraje, Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola; his wife,
Sherifat and Representative of Senator Oluremi Tinubu, Alhaja Rashidat
Are, during the Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola, at Eko Hotel Lagos State on Sunday 2/11/2014.

From right -* Governor State of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, Former
Governor State of Osun, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Speaker,
Federal House of Representative, Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, during the
Victory Colloquium for Aregbesola, at Eko
Hotel Lagos State on Sunday 2/11/2014.

OSUN State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has called on the people of Burkina Faso not to allow military rule after the exit of Blaise Compaore.
Aregbesola charged the Burkinabes to carry the revolution that ousted Compaore to its logical conclusion by forming a national government that will conduct election in the shortest time possible.
This was even as the Speaker, House of Representatives, Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, called on all stakeholders in the Nigerian project to get their acts together and ensure that a good leader is elected for the country in 2015.
Aregbesola who spoke at a Victory Colloquium at the Eko Hotel, Lagos, said the Burkina Faso situation was a signal to Nigerians to gird their loins and prepare for the February 2015 general elections.
He said the organisation of elections will not come easy as the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, will want to use force it could muster to stay in power.
While decrying the militarisation of election and Federal Government’s lawlessness and impunity against political opposition in Nigeria, Aregbesola warned political office holders to comport themselves to civil rule so as not to give the military any excuse to take power as it is no longer fashionable for military coup in Africa.
VANGUARD

An ambitious project, which is set to change the face of new town concept in the country, has been flagged off by the Government of the State of Osun. The project, christened, Oranmiyan New Town, is coming after a long wait for a more conducive livable town in the state.
The scheme, measuring about 2,572 hectares of land, about 6340 acres, was first acquired by Chief Obafemi Awolowo as the Premier of the old Western Region in between 1962 and 1966 for the purpose of banishing hunger and poverty and unemployment among the people.
Promoted by the Ministry of the Lands, Physical Planning and Urban Development with support of an inter-ministerial committee, the new town is expected to have over 3,000 residential plots of varying densities, with the smallest plot being in the region of 1,000 square metres. It is also expected to cater for an estimated population of over 80,000 people. Amongst proposed basic infrastructural facilities, utilities and services within are road networks, uninterrupted electricity, water reticulation, drainage system, sewage system and other communal facilities.
Under the new town scheme, a comprehensive development plan has been mapped, which will comprise seven neighborhoods, each accommodating private estate developments, commercial shops, strip malls, community centres, recreational facilities, police posts, and health centres; The recreational area will also have tennis and squash courts, 18-Hole Golf Course and Polo Ground.
The site was formerly being used for farming purpose until after the creation of State from the erstwhile Oyo State resulting to the mass movement of people into the State from neighbouring States apart from the civil servant who were to relocate compulsorily. “This scenario eventually led to shortage of housing accommodation for people hence the inauguration of an inter-ministerial Committee to work out a modality for the utilization of the hitherto “Osun Farm Settlement” for its highest and best use the committee thereafter came out with their recommendation that the large parcel of land should be converted into a Government Reservation Area, change of use of which came into effect since 1994 and tagged Osun GRA, Gbongan Road.”
Speaking at the flagging off ceremony of the project, Governor Rauf Aregbesola said: “On assumption of office, the Ministry saddled with the responsibility of managing Government land in the State deemed it fit to re-develop the remaining parcel of land within the GRA measuring up to 1,200 hectares into a new town that shall be a model that other neighbouring State will learn from.”
He recalled that as a result of lack of proper urban physical planning, which the State experienced in the past during which people carried out physical development as they wished with attendant problem of perennial flooding, intra-city traffic and transportation problems unkempt environment leading to health hazard, it takes courage for one to break this jinx through the introduction of pragmatic and practical urban development control.
His words: “Osun is an urbanized State. Hardly can one travels in the State for a distance of ten kilometres without passing through a community. Apart from this, the rate of influx of people from rural to urban area, a process called urbanization is alarming and leading to development of shanty towns, ghettos and urban decay (slums) and sprawls.”
According to the governor, developing new towns is a common phenomenon all over the world. The purpose of developing a new town is basically to create an environment that is aesthetically pleasing for living, working and recreating. More often than not, a new town can serve as a satellite town to an existing urban centre that has more or less reached its optimum level of growth so as to give room for its upgrading and partial re-development.
Governor Aregbesola pointed out that “when fully developed, the New Town will serve as a growth pole to the area surrounding it. There is no doubting the fact that this new town scheme shall add another feather to the cap of this state, which is already known for being the first in a lot of programmes that are meant for bettering the lots of the citizenry. As already, this State is the only one that had prepared Structural Plans for nine of her major cities throughout the country; it is also only the State of Osun where Urban Renewal programs had commenced in nine cities at the same time! With all these developmental programs, the State is expected to stretch her neck higher and above those of her contemporaries in the nearest future.”
The State’s Commissioner for Lands, Physical Planning and Urban Development, Mr. Olumuyiwa Ige, explained that the basic concept of developing a new town is to provide a balanced and self-contained community as far as possible in term of the provisions of infrastructure and community facilities.
He explained that it is with a view to achieving the concept that Oranmiyan New Town was designed to comprise seven neighbourhoods to accommodate housing of different densities (Low, medium and High); commercial service; industrial and public cum semi-public uses; supported by essential infrastructure and community facilities; such as police posts, community centres, elementary, middle and high schools, places of worship, neighbourhood parks, health and centres, amongst others.
He said that an Inter-Ministerial Committee by Government met severally and came up with a recommendation that the hitherto Osun Farm Settlement should be converted and used as a Government Reservation Area called Osun GRA, Gbongan Road. “Before now the GRA had been broken into phases and developed in peace meals.”The remaining portion of the land had been comprehensively designed for development of a New Town-Oranmiyan New Town for the purpose of creating an urban environment that reflects the unique local flavours of its landscapes and cultural settings, while at the same line aspiring for universal qualities of accessibility, livability, safety and modernity,” he said.
Ige, an architect, disclosed that “Oranmiyan New Town has three major categories of roads: The Main Boulevard that collects the New Town to the External Osogbo-Gbongan Road from the Nigerian Police Zone II Headquarters’ end. The road has a right of way of 42metres broken into the dual carriage ways, median strip, drain and utility lane.
“Oranmiyan New Town boasts of botanical garden, commercial strips of plots along major roads, serviced plots, a Down Town/Central Business District (CBD) with varying land uses (religions, educational, commercial, institutional and light industrial outfits. In addition, three Arms Zone has been created to accommodate and incorporation the House of Assembly (Legislature); Proposed High Court and Judiciary Quarters (Judiciary) and the Governor’s Office (Executive), in addition to the proposed New Government House.”
Owning a parcel of land within the scheme also varies depending on the category and size of plot desired.
For instance, potential investors in the residential plots are required to obtain an application form for making a premium deposit of N60, 000.
A premium of N1, 000 per square metre (m2 ), and development levy of N2, 000/m2 , is applicable as payment. Other incidental expenses, such as survey fee, deed preparation fee, deed registration fee and annual ground rent of N15/m2 are applicable. For commercial / industrial plots, the same process applies, but with a higher premium of N1, 500/m2.
DAILY INDEPENDENT

THE Justice Research Centre (JRC) in Benin, Edo State, has hailed the conduct of the August 9, 2014, governorship election in Osun State, describing it as a reflection of the will of the people of the state.
The JRC also added that the outcome of the election has helped the process of institutionalising the sanctity of the electoral ballot in the country.
The statement signed by the chairman of the centre, Inwalomhe Donald, noted that “unlike Nigeria ’s previous elections, particularly the pre-2011 elections where dead voters and votes held sway, the Osun election voters and votes were not robotically created.
TRIBUNE

The Chairman, Osogbo branch, Nigerian Society of Engineers, Mr. Adeniran Ibitoye, has commended Osun State Governor, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, for his administration’s efforts on urban renewal and the creation of the Oranmiyan New Town.
He made the commendation in an interview with our correspondent in Osogbo during the inaugural meeting of the new executive council.
The chairman, who said that the society was able to mobilise more members to attend the meeting, added that the new leadership of the NSE had secured and furnished office accommodation for members of the council.
Ibitoye said, “Osogbo is now more populated with the influx of people since the inception of the present administration, hence the need for expansion and more decent accommodation to create a healthy environmental, which will help the citizens to have a better living.
“Because of the present government’s focus on giving more dividends of democracy to the people of the state, there is a need to yield to the pressure from people in the area of urban renewal and infrastructural development.
“The new town is a laudable project. It will create more decent accommodation for the people and it will surely increase the population of the state.”
The NSE chairman said Aregbesola had patronised indigenous contractors in projects embarked upon by his administration, but appealed to the governor to make use of them more.
The governor had said during its inauguration that the Oranmiyan New Town, which will have over 3,000 residential plots, was also borne out of an overriding public need to ease the pressure of accommodation on Osogbo as the state capital.
OSUN DEFENDER

The embattled Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal, on Sunday, commended the people of Osun State for “resisting principalities from Abuja” and re-electing Governor Rauf Aregbesola on August 9.
He urged all Nigerians to do the same in 2015, and elect a new government that can provide leadership to the country.
Tambuwal spoke in Lagos at a colloquium for Governor Rauf Aregbesola, organised by The Gazelle News, his first public appearance since his security details were withdrawn due to his defection from the ruling Peoples Democratic Party to the All Progressives Congress.
He said the PDP-led Federal Government tried as much as possible to scuttle the re-election of Aregbesola and the victory of the APC in Osun.
He said, “I congratulate the people of Osun for resisting those principalities from Abuja; for resisting those members of the armed forces and security agents who should have been at Sambisa Forest then but were misdirected and were unleashed on the peaceful people of Osun.
“Therefore, in 2015, the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria should remain resolved to exercise their franchise and ensure that they elect people who can provide leadership. This country belongs to all of us, it doesn’t belong to a cabal; it doesn’t belong to an individual. We are all stakeholders in the Nigerian project. We should come together and ensure that come 2015, we will get the right leadership for this country.”
The Speaker refused to speak in details about the issues surrounding his defection.
He said, “Since the beginning of the drama in Abuja, I’ve not made any public appearance before today. The matter is in court, I’ll not say much but to draw attention to this, before my defection, the governor of Ondo State defected alongside the Speaker of that state legislature. I believe there was no pronouncement by the Inspector-General of Police that that Speaker had lost his seat.”
Aregbesola thanked all those who contributed to his success at the polls including a former Governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu; a former Governor of Osun State, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola; and Alhaji Kawu Baraje, who represented former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who was scheduled to chair the occasion.
Aregbesola, however, warned that recent events in Burkina Faso was a clarion call to Nigerians to get ready for revolution in 2015 in the case the PDP-led Federal Government attempts to rig the election.
He said, “It won’t come cheap. It didn’t come cheap in Osun. We fought and fought and fought to be able to resist them.
“From the surveys we have conducted, the PDP cannot win any free and fair election in any part of Nigeria because they have brought woes, sorrows and tears to Nigerians and they must just go.”
The National Legal Adviser of the APC, Muiz Banire, who was the guest speaker at the event, noted that it was Aregbesola’s popularity that won the election for the party.
He urged the party to embrace internal democracy that would ensure that the most popular aspirants emerged as the party’s candidates.
Banire also kicked against zoning and religious consideration in making the choice of candidates.
OSUN DEFENDER

The Osun State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the August 9 election in the state, Senator Iyiola Omisore, to discontinue his petition to challenge the victory of Governor Rauf Aregbesola.
According to the APC, “Omisore’s exercise would be as futile as that of his party’s  wasted effort to annul the legislative elections of 2011 in which all the PDP candidates lost their bid to be elected into the state and national assemblies.
The party’s spokesman, Kunle Oyatomi, said: “From what the public has seen and heard so far, Omisore and the PDP appear to be relying purely on falsehood, and not facts on the ground, and their lies are falling apart like a pack of cards.”
It noted that last Friday, the Osun PDP withdrew a case seeking to declare null, the election supervised by Ambassador Rufus Akeju, the state Independent National Electoral Commissioner (INEC), Resident Electoral Commissioner in the state, at the Federal High Court in Osogbo through a motion dated October 15, and signed by their counsel, Kehinde Adesiyan.
It recalled that the PDP, prior to he 2011 elections, approached the Federal High Court in Osogbo for an injunction to restrain Akeju from supervising the conduct of the election and was granted, but was appealed against by INEC at the Court of Appeal in Akure.
The APC said: “The Appeal Court three weeks ago struck out INEC’s appeal due to what it termed ‘defective filing of the notice.’ Omisore and the PDP attempted to turn the ruling to a ‘judgment’ sacking all the state legislators both in Osun and Abuja. But when it became clear that the PDP couldn’t win on this falsehood, it had the case withdrawn from the Federal High Court in Osogbo last Friday.”
The APC stressed that PDP’s  lie was so blatant and embarrassing that even some responsible members of the PDP within and outside the state felt sad and ashamed that so much falsehood was being associated with their party.
It added that the same line was being towed with another lie that the tribunal had ordered a recount of votes for which the tribunal chairman denied and warned the party to allow them do their job.
According to the party, the PDP appeared not to have learnt anything from the pressure of spreading deliberate falsehood.
‘This inability to learn from history is what has made the PDP and Omisore replicate the futile mission all over again, and that anything founded on falsehood will fail and the current mission of Omisore, which is fundamentally based on ignoble lies will also collapse,” the APC predicted.
The party said it was therefore in the interest of Omisore, the PDP and fledging democracy that this mission impossible be aborted before it pollutes the democratic atmosphere.
It remarked that the earlier Omisore comes to terms with the reality that he is just chasing shadow, the better for everybody.
THISDAY

The State of Osun Elementary School Feeding and Health Programme (O-MEALS) has been described as the best and most organized in the country which other states need to emulate.
This was the submission of a 17- member Delta State Committee on Food and Nutrition who were in Osun to understudy the Osun school feeding programme of the state.
Speaking on behalf of other members, the Coordinator of the Committee who is also the UNICEF Desk Officer in the Delta State Ministry of Finance, Mr. Akozor Nduka disclosed that, the aim of the Delta state government is to introduce school feeding as an intervention to encourage pupils in crisis prone communities of the state.
Akozor who stated that, a hungry pupil as a result of the poverty level of the parent cannot concentrate in class, held that the best way to encourage attendance, enrolment and concentration is by introducing school feeding at least once daily.
He emphasized on the need for other states including Delta to understudy the school feeding programme of Osun as a role model so as to succeed.
According to him, Osun is the leading example among the states of the federation carrying out the school feeding programme in the right way.
He stressed that, arrangement would be made to ensure those in authority and policy makers in Delta state to come to the State of Osun to see things for themselves in a bid to facilitate quick implementation of the programme in the South Southern State.
Earlier, the State Operation officer for Osun School Feeding and Health Programmes, Mrs. Olubunmi Ayoola while briefing the delegates before the field inspection hinted that, Osun School Feeding gulps N12.7 million daily.
Mrs. Ayoola  maintained that, the Governor of the State of Osun ,Ogbeni Rauf Adesoji Aregbesola is passionate in bridging the gap between the children of the poor and the rich through O-meals and other School facilities he provided, thereby making him to regard it as an investment in the lives of the future leaders rather than expenditure.
Mrs. Ayoola stressed that, nutritious menu used for the school feeding programme has tremendously impacted in the retentive and enrolment capacity of the pupils, while urging the delegates to make the best use of the Osun experience.
Part of the tour of the Delta state committee was the physical inspection of O-Meals food vendors and their food at L.A Elementary Model School, Imo, Ilesa as well as how centrally distributed food items like beef, fish and egg are being processed, packaged and distributed at abattoir in Ilesa and Feg Agro Farm, Ijeda-ijesa respectively.
BIOREPORTS