 The National Publicity Secretary of the People's Democratic Party, PDP Kola Olobodian, says Governor Yahya Bello of Kogi State cannot point to any development projects he implemented for the benefit of the people. He lamented that Governor Bello had turned Kogi into the most backward state in the country with infrastructural decay, arding that he uses the resources of the people of Kogi State for his benefit. However, the State Commissioner for Information, Kingsley Farnwall, while reacting described the Lokbodian statement as reckless and force, undeserving of a response from the government. But he's here with us, joining us live from Kogi State. Thank you very much, Mr Farnwall, for joining us. We appreciate it. Thank you very much for having me. So Governor Yahya Bello has been in the news for an upwards of, you know, since the beginning of the year with his public statement of trying to run for presidency. He's given us feelings that he wants to run for presidency. He said that the people of his zone deserve a turn for the presidency. But let's start with, because you know what they say, charity begins at home. And there's been a lot of people who've criticized his mode of governance in the state, and many people have decried, you know, a poor infrastructural development. I know he's your boss and you are here to defend his honor. But how well do you think the governor has done so far? And why should we as Nigerians even give him an opportunity to run for president? Thank you very much. And I also want to thank viewers around the world. The governor has done fantastically in terms of infrastructure development in the states. The state inherited was a state that was not having much infrastructure in terms of road, in terms of schools, in terms of hospitals and all that. But the governor has been able to upscale this and raise it to the level of pride that we have today. So, so far, I would say he has done so beautifully in ensuring Kogi's infrastructure is improved. Cola Lobudino has said that in terms of infrastructure, there's been decay. He didn't even say he has not done anything. He said it's been decaying, meaning that the ones that had been there have gradually been eroded. He's also said that public funds are being used by the governor for his personal benefit. Thank you very much. I sympathize with Mr. Cola Lobudino as a matter of fact, he's someone that I respect personally. I sympathize with him. He's doing a very tough job. It is very tough. There are two jobs that are very tough. One, it is tough to defend someone who is not doing well. Secondly, it is tough to discredit someone who is doing so well. In this case, we are going to deal with the latter. He's struggling to discredit a governor that has done so well. Cola Lobudino is from Kabatau in Kogi State. As to speak, the entire road network in Kabatau is undergoing massive reconstruction. You can send your reporter to go to Kabatau and see the beautiful road that we have given to the people of Kabatau. They are very happy with this administration. They have been commanding the governor. They have been condemning what Mr. Cola Lobudino said about the government. So that's why I said I really sympathize with him. You cannot say that the governor has not done anything when he's currently changing the face of your own very town. So it's a very difficult one. I sympathize with him. I see. I'm curious to know. I'm sure that Kabatau is a very beautiful place, which I have read about. Is road infrastructure or new faith or faith sleeves for the roads in Kabatau, the most important thing you think the people of Kabatau need? Kabatau is one of the very most important towns in Nigeria from the days of the Kabatau province. It is the only provincial headquarter that is not a state capital today. Yes, we know this. But what do you think that the people of Kabatau really need right now? Is it a road? Let me come to that. Kabatau is a place that is fast growing as a commercial center, a place that is known for agricultural activities, a place that a couple of industries are springing up, a place that an agricultural community of Kabatau will read about it. What I want you to know is that without good road network, it is going to be very difficult for a place to be commercially viable. So that is why we need to pull that infrastructure there so that we can raise Kabatau to the level of our counterparts across the country as a town that is ready for economic good. Okay. The NUJ at some point had come to the governor to ask for him to rehabilitate the bad roads in the state capital, which is Lokoja. As we speak, and I have spoken to a couple of people, that there are still terrible roads in Lokoja, which is the capital, and you're telling me about Kabatau, which is amazing. But what is the situation of the state of roads in Lokoja, as we speak? The state of Nigeria is usually for state governors to concentrate all the resources at the state capital to ensure that the state capital looks beautiful. To come to the state capital and say, oh, wow, this government is doing a lot of things. But in our own situation, we understand the point of developing the rural areas. And that is why we have concentrated the resources of the Kogi people in developing areas that are not in the state capital. As we speak, we have come back to the state capital and there is massive reconstruction of the road network in the state capital. Most of the road that Kogi state is condemned of not fixing are basically federal roads across the state. But we know that the federal government does not use the roads in Kogi state. Our people use those roads. So that's why we have come back to the state capital now to do what we have done in various places across the state, in the normal local government, in the local government, in the Olamaboro local government, in Yagba East local government, virtually across the state. So we have come back to the state capital now to be able to attend to the roads at the state capital. We are not going to dance to the tune of just concentrating on roads or infrastructure development at the state capital. The people at the rural areas give the massive support that brought the governor in the first term and the second term. And we cannot forget them and concentrate on the state capital. So we've concentrated on those areas. We are doing a lot in those rural areas. In Kogi East, for instance, we have about 240 communities that are not connected to the national grid. We embarked on a massive and an ambitious project to ensure that we connect them to the national grid, call it Operation Light Up Kogi East. And as you speak, that project is about 95% completed. These are the things that are taking our resources. Things that have direct bearing on that man in the village of Iluke, Akutukpa, Abejukolo, Okene and all those places. So that is what we are concentrating on. Interesting. I want to understand why the issue of salary payments is still lingering. It's something we heard last year, we're still hearing it this year. What is the challenge? And for a state like Kogi State that's not known for the food basket or as big as Lagos, what exactly is the source of revenue apart from going capping hand to the federal government at the end of every month to get your allocation? What is the government doing to grow a sudden industry that can fund the state other than going capping hand at the end of the month? I think you are mistaking Kogi for some states that have not been able to pay salary to their workers. I'm not mistaken. As you speak, Kogi is not only a single month salary, we pay salary regularly. And you can confirm from the civil servants who are the direct beneficiaries of this. So the issue of salary is not an issue in Kogi State. And under this administration, we have been able to grow the economy to a place that should be respected by all Nigerians. And one of the first things you need to do is to fix your security. And today, Kogi is one of the most secure states. We came from one of the most insecure states, the Kingdom capital, the Amdrabi capital, the Banker capital of the country to becoming one of the safest states in the country. And that is why you see many of these A-list industries as springing up in Kogi State. One of them is Unicay, which a lot of our people have been employed. You have all the kind of companies in Ajaputa, in Obajano, in Kotongkarafi, all over the places. They are springing up because we have created an environment that enables businesses to grow and thrive. And that is why Kogi is having all of these industries. So we don't have the problem of salary. We have grown our economy. Our internally generated revenue is rising every month. We inherited 350 million era when we came in and we have grown it today to go to take billion era on a monthly basis. What is your idea at the moment as compared to what you had before? Can you give me a number, a figure, because you just told me that the idea is growing. When we came in, it was 350 million era. Today, we are close to 3 billion. I may not be able to say exactly, but we are 2.7 billion era. If I went via the FOI to your Board of Internal Revenue, I will get 3 billion plus. You will get. No, no, no. I didn't say 3 billion plus. I said we are close to 3 billion today. Close to 3 billion. Yeah. At the point, we were going even beyond 3 billion before we came with the issue of pandemic came in and it affected. The economies around us, not necessarily our own state, but when the economy is around you so far, then it will have some negative effect on your own economy. So that is why we have not been able to cross that 3 billion line. But we hope to grow the economy of the state to the point that we are able to generate enough revenue to be able to develop the state. We have moved positively away from what it used to be in the past. Talking about the pandemic, let's go back to the beginning of the pandemic. Your governor seemed to not have believed that there was anything like COVID, which also had, you know, you maybe had some brush with the NCDC and of course other people, governments and leaders of thought. What made your governor say that there was no such thing as COVID in your state? We did not suffer COVID attack in Kogi state and we did not even, we did not believe that it was something that the nation or the world should devote all the attention, all the resources to attack. Why? There is something that should have been a handshake between common sense and science. So you do not believe that COVID is deadly enough to make the whole world worried? In that case, we allowed the politicians to dictate to the scientists and they foisted on us a situation where we were going. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Come back. Did you say that we allowed politicians to dictate to the scientists? Yes. We allowed politicians to dictate to the scientists. I don't remember our politicians being the ones who told us that there was COVID. The scientists are the ones who knew what COVID was and how an epidemic works or a pandemic. So at what point did politicians start dictating? Because if you're talking now that, if you're saying that politicians were dictating then it means that your governor falls in that category and he was telling scientists that there was no COVID as opposed to the fact that we were dealing with a pandemic worldwide but your governor chose to pay a blind eye to it and made people who probably were having that particular pandemic or the virus think that there was no such thing and then it spread more and more. Well, you say it spread but as far as we are concerned in our states, we did not witness that. Did you try testing? Did you try testing? Because you can't say that there is no such thing if you are not testing. We were one of the first states that brought in test kits. We allowed people to go and do tests. There are criteria that were set by the NCDC and they told us that when you go through all those things you have to subject yourself to test. We allowed people to go for tests. We set up isolation centers. We set up test centers for people to test. How do you do all of those things if you don't believe that there is a pandemic? No, the issue is this. When you say there is a pandemic, if you are not conducting tests, how will you prove that the pandemic was a mere concoction of politicians who wanted to drag it down the throat of scientists that it is something that is going to kill the world? Are we still saying the same thing today? Are we still witnessing the same thing today? There is an Olympic Games that is going on. Are we seeing that there? So you are telling me that you still don't believe? I'm sorry, Honorable Commissioner, are you telling me that there is a pandemic? That whatever you are doing now is because you just want to fulfill righteousness. Is that what you are telling me? Because you are pointing to the fact that there is an Olympic holding in Japan. It is to prove that there is no pandemic. It is not only the politicians, the media contributed very largely to it. We know that this is an attempt to ruin the economy of the world, to ruin the economy of Nigeria. I'm not going to let you on national TV spew ignorance. So I'm going to ask you this question. Have you taken your COVID vaccine? Okay, let me. Oh, it's a yes or no question. No, no, no, it's a yes or no question. Have you taken, no, no, it's simple. Have you or have you not? And your reasons are best known to you. Have you taken the vaccine or not? Have you been vaccinated or not? Have you been vaccinated or not? So that is the situation. It's your choice. So I'm going to ask the question one last time. Are you vaccinated? And your national television is very disrespectful. I'm sorry. And it seems I've come from you. I'm sorry. Have you been vaccinated? Do you think you should be vaccinated? Is it important for you to get vaccinated or not? If and when I have it, I'll be vaccinated. What do you mean by if and when you have it? The vaccine was the first and second phase was state nationwide? Why do I need vaccination when I am not under any threat of COVID-19? Have you traveled out of Kogi States lately? I travel out of Kogi States all the time. As I talk to you, I'm not even in Kogi States. And you don't think that the virus can be a threat to you as a person? It's not a threat to me. It's not a threat to anyone. And so you would not tell the people, because you're the information commissioner and this is information that you're giving to me that you do not believe in the virus. And so you don't think that people should protect themselves against it because you don't think it exists. We have the vaccines in Kogi States. We're a very democratic government. As a co-guide, if you think that you need a COVID-19 vaccine, you walk into our centers and take the vaccine. We have the vaccines in the States. So we are not forcing it on anyone. And we will not force anyone to take it and we will not stop anyone who wants or wish to take it from taking it. Well, thank you very much. King Lefaneuil is the Honourable Commissioner for Information, Kogi State, and he's been our guest. Thank you very much for speaking with us. We appreciate it. Thank you very much. All right. Well, we'll take a short break. And when we come back, I will give you my take. It's time for my take. It's interesting that we're always pointing fingers to our governors, our leaders, politicians, when things are not going the way we want them to. And we're very quick to call the Constitution or say, well, this is our right. But it's also your right to go out and vote. It's your voice. It's your power. And when you do not vote, here's what happens. Someone is there waiting to press. Yeah, you know, just keep Tom printing and filling the ballot box. Look at what happened over the past two weeks. These people that we call our leaders were given a mandate to allow for electronic transmission of votes. And of course, we need this e-voting system. So that we can, you know, one way or the other, get beyond the bottlenecks and all of the drama and cut out the issue of, you know, buying or, you know, taking advantage of the fact that people didn't show up and, you know, electoral malpractices. This is what we wanted that particular thing to do for us. But our politicians, some parts of them decided that they were going to vote against it. We're still waiting for the House of Representatives to see if they could overturn it. But we cannot keep waiting for our politicians to do right by us. We also need to do right by ourselves. Do you have a voter's card? Have you ever registered to be voted? Are you 18 plus? I don't care if I have to do this every day. Go and get a voter's card. It's now made easy. You can go online and register. Get your voter's card. And when it's election day, go out and vote for whoever you want. Because if you also do not vote, you have also made a choice. You have decided that whatever they do, whether they do it in your favor or not because you did not vote, it still affects you. You're complaining today that you cannot afford egg. You're complaining about the cost of living rising high and your salary is not being increased. What are you going to do about this? You can't just go on social media, cry and grumble and tweet. It doesn't change anything. Protests are not enough. You need to vote. You need to come out and vote. I know that we're tired of our politicians and things are not going the way we wanted, but we need to also make an impact of sorts. Start educating yourself. Start educating your family members. Let them know the importance of voting. Don't say, oh, whether we vote or not, they know who they will choose. Well, if you know that they know who they will choose, then become members of those political parties. So you also have a right to choose from when whoever is being foisted on the party. That way, you know that we push for this guy. And then when we're voting, we're voting for this guy. Don't sit at home and just say, oh, it's Deanna, Nigeria. They can do what they like. Your vote is your power. I'm Mary-Anna Cohn. Thank you for watching.