Nine months after Gboyega Oyetola was sworn in as the governor of Osun State, he is yet to constitute his executive council as he has continued to run the state with supervisors instead of commissioners.
Oyetola was sworn in as Osun governor on November 27, 2018.
Analysts fear his administration is following the antecedent of the immediate past governor, Rauf Aregbesola, who during his second term in office refused to appoint commissioners for more than a year due to what he tagged financial constraints.
A political analysts, Kehinde Orioye who spoke to journalists on the development remarked that while the constitution provides for the appointment of commissioners, Oyetola simply used his discretion to appoint supervisors for some ministries he considers very important.
Seven supervisors have been appointed to do the work of commissioners over the ministries of works, finance, agriculture, home affairs, education and information.
“The governor has simply shown that he can manage the affairs of the state with his discretion. While the Constitution provided for the appointment of commissioners he has refused to do so. This, he may not consider key to his government.
“Appointment of supervisors for some ministries is not even approved by the law. You don’t edit the provision of the law. The law says commissioner not ministries supervisors nor supervising commissioners. If the seven ministries are the only ministries considered key to running a government, then we should scrap others,” Orioye argued.
However, a source at the Government House was quoted as saying that the delay was due to two basic reasons: first that the governor wanted to ensure that he will not be sacked by the court following the decision of the major opposition candidate, Ademola Adeleke, to contest the election results and secondly to make sure the presidential election was held before appointing commissioners to avoid any division that may occur from the selection.
“By the time his Excellency was inaugurated, it was not certain that we will remain in government.
In fact, there was high tension after the tribunal upturned the election. Appointment of commissioners at that critical points cannot be done. We need to be sure that all is well before nominating commissioners. The focus of the government then was simply how to remain in office”.
