Barely 72 hours after their formal installation by the Olubeshe of Ibeshe Land, Oba Richard Abayomi Ogunsanya, as Asiwaju and Yeye Asiwaju of Ibeshe Land, Asiwaju Kaoli Olusanya and his beautiful wife, Chief Mrs Oluwakemi Olusanya seem to have hit the ground running.
The couple who are both residents and business owners in the community has said that, they are ready to lead from the front towards driving the developmental agenda of Ibeshe Community.
In a chat with members of the Press, Kaoli reeled out some of his plans.
‘The plan is to escalate those activities that have become natural to myself and my wife, Ruth Olukemi Olanrewaju Olusanya’, he said.
‘What is natural to us is first and foremost, Education. This is because we believe that Sons and daughters of Mr Nobody can tomorrow sit as a person of substance, who can add value to the community through quality education’, he added.
‘The plan is to escalate what we have been doing over the years. What we have been doing over the years is to go round public and private primary schools in this community. Now it has even gone beyond this community, we conduct entrance examinations and we discover that there are very brilliant children there. We being them from when they are in primary 6 with the consent and approval of the Lagos State Ministry of Education and we bring them to the Kith & Kin hostel and from that Primary 6 till he or she leaves College that is, for 6 years, their education is absolutely free. We want to do more of that. That is natural to us’, he promised.
‘And now as the Asiwaju of the Community, we want to do more. To do more is now to mobilise. There are men of resources here. There are businesses in Ibeshe’, he noted.
‘I can say without any fear of contradiction that almost 50% of all the sharp sand used in construction in Lagos State, comes from this place. So businesses are booming here. Then you see the traffic on the road and the types of vehicles plying the road, that shows that there is something here; there are some commercial value here that people are coming to tap’.
‘So those are the types of energies and resources that we can bring together so that they can contribute to the development of our community, in terms of infrastructure development, creating jobs and giving people hope. Expanding that hope for the young people. So that our young ones would be calm, since they will be engaged, they will see opportunities for training to be engaged to be employed and to have a future themselves. When they have hope, everybody will calm down. That is what we want to create for them. So that what we enjoyed when we were their age; the opportunities in Nigeria, in scholarship, in education, in jobs, that is what we want to bring to Ibeshe and by extension Ikorodu Division’.
Yeye Asiwaju, Oluwakemi Olusanya also corroborated her husband’s position.
‘I want to use this opportunity to say a very big thank you to the King, HRM Oba Richard Abayomi Ogunsanya. This is a long well deserved honour and we want to say a very big thank you to him and I know he is really charging us with more responsibilities, because like the Asiwaju has already said, this is a very huge role we have been playing and as Yeye Asiwaju I know much is expected because I know “To whom much is given, much more is expected.”,.she said.
‘I have been playing this role subtly and I know that we are going to do more. I am a teacher and I love to play around children, I feel them and they feel me. So as Yeye Asiwaju of Ibeshe Land, in terms of education and as a role model in my own capacity and in my profession, all I can do is to engage their children, in whatever way we can help in terms of education, we will not relent in doing that’, she promised.
‘We have been doing that because I know sometimes ago I know we are always mobilising materials, resources, benches, chairs to all neighbouring schools with a sort of collaboration with the teachers’, she submitted.
Asiwaju Olusanya continued, ‘Being the honorary Chief, representing the Kabiyesi of this community, HRM Oba Richard Abayomi Ogunsanya and of course, Oba Kabir Adewale Shotobi, together with the Obas and opinion leaders and people in high places who are in the community, we can all, like we did when chief B.O Benson SAN was still alive and he attracted, in collaboration with myself and other people, we brought in this (Ibeshe) road’.
‘This road was totally impassable for years until we made appeal to His Excellency Babatunde Raji Fashola and today we are enjoying that road and as a result of that we can see the implication of that in the businesses around this area. Without that road those businesses would not boom’.
Speaking further, Asiwaju Kaoli Olusanya also spoke of his plans to galvanize the development of Ikorodu Division as a whole.
‘Then, what do we want to do for Ikorodu Division? As Asiwaju, working with the Obas, is more infrastructure. We need road networks all around. From Sabo market to Itoikin.
We want four lanes on either sides. That road was built and commissioned several years ago by General Yakubu Gowon so, in terms of durability, the lifespan of that road has expired. Now we have our own President, a president that is part of us that is also part of me, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, first thing we would push to him is to please do something about that road from Sabo to Itoikin; four lanes. You can imagine the transformation, the businesses that would also spring up’.
‘Similarly, we have some road networks within Ikorodu. The fourth mainland bridge is there and the federal government has to really support Lagos State to be able to make it happen; to actualise that dream. If it happens, you can imagine what would happen from Bayeiku to Selewu, from Selewu to Igbogbo, from Igbogbo to Itamaga, from Itamaga to Owutu, from Owutu to Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. It is going to really assist and that is only way business can boom, if there is accessibility and of course other infrastructures will follow’.
‘Another thing we want to push to Mr President, because the investment is high, Lagos State will need support, that is a flyover that is in terms of commerce, industry and the movement of people around here, we need a flyover at Ogolonto. Maybe another one at Agric and the third one at the Ikorodu Garage Roundabout. It is needed. This would minimise the waste of time on the road, it will make commuting very easy and if we do all that it implication to improve security; movement’.
‘We would also ask Mr President for electricity improvement. When he was Lagos State Governor, the first IPP that was brought to Nigeria was brought by Mr President. Now that he is President, we want an improvement of that so that electricity would be stable.
When electricity is stable, when there is good road network; people can move freely, housing, education is good Nigerians would find their feet, they would blend in and everybody will be able to challenge himself to make contributions to the wealth of the nation to build the type of nation we want’, he stressed.
Concluding, Asiwaju Kaoli Olusanya stressed that, the type of Nation we want must come from the contribution of all to the nation, but to do that there must be enabling environment to be created by Mr President.
