There are scores of reasons why the young, the old; the natives and visitors; male and female citizens of Ondo State are massively supporting Igbotako-born billionaire, Senator Jimoh Folorunso Ibrahim to become the governor of Ondo State as the state goes to the poll in November this year. Here are the ten solid reasons I think the senator, lawyer, entrepreneur, philanthropist, scholar, and politician should govern Ondo State:
Ability to create wealth
One key index to know someone who will do very well as governor is answering the question: “Can the person create wealth?” Anybody can spend money! Call anybody and give him or her N10 billion monthly allocation and see if he would not spend it all within hours! But ask the person to double the N10 billion in six months, you will know the difference between kalokalo and kolo. Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, Lateef Jakande, Olusegun Agagu and all governors that ever did well had the rare quality of being able to create and grow wealth. They all doubled, then quadrupled the incomes of their states under their leadership. Jakande simply opened up the Lekki area and jacked up land charges to do all the incredible things he did in Lagos. Tinubu introduced creative internal revenue system and recreated wealth and increase Lagos State income five times over. Agagu started his own strategy long before he became governor by simply using his expertise as a geologist. He had found that some oil-producing areas of Ondo State were wrongly placed in Delta State and he ensured that necessary boundary adjustments were made. That strategic move made Ondo State substantially placed as a solid oil-producing state earning more money from the Federation Account. Dr. Jimoh Ibrahim is a genius when it comes to creating wealth. What a great talent God gave him! Here is the son of a bricklayer and petty trader who started business as an A-level student at Federal School of Arts and Science Ondo, selling hand-outs and who grew his passion to becoming a billionaire at age 30! He is the only aspirant in Ondo State, so far who has highlighted how he would generate income to develop the state. That is the crux of the matter. You need money to pay workers, pensioners, build infrastructure, take care of the aged etc. Senator Ibrahim’s Bitumen Act has gotten far in the National Assembly. That Act alone would generate billions of dollars for the State in the near future. He has spoken of turning the granite hills of Ondo into quarries and liaising with construction companies to use them to build roads. He has spoken of establishing Ondo Oil & Gas in which all local governments would be stakeholders to generate revenue; how our universities and polytechnics would generate income; how local governments would generate incomes; how Ilaje Ese Odo would become the fish basket of Nigeria and how glass production would be brought back, all of these creating massive jobs. Etc.
Ability to manage wealth
It is one thing to create wealth and yet another thing to grow and manage it. As it is said, “it is difficult getting to the top but more difficult staying on top.” How many people were millionaires or billionaires and were able to sustain the status for over two decades do you know? Dr. Jimoh Ibrahim is a shrewd businessman and entrepreneur who knows how to manage resources. Many people criticize him for “wasting resources” because of they see his assets seemingly lying idle, but that, in fact, is what stands him out. What you think is “assets” to him are ‘wastes” that he is planning to convert to assets. He is an investment expert who uses economic indices to predict asset growth and does not waste his time on unproductive enterprises. He once told me: “See Bolu, why I am different is that I think big, and many people think small. Both of us are taking risks, thinking or not thinking. Those taking small risks will not be adversely affected when they don’t succeed in the risks they have taken. I who take big risks will be more devastatingly affected if I fail. Yet, I prefer to take big risks. I don’t take small risks. The small risk taker is afraid, saying ‘what if I fail’. Me, the big risk taker do not believe in failure because I take calculated risks. My focus is ‘what if I succeed’” Ibrahim believes that if you earn, say, N30k in a month and that salary is increased to N60k monthly and you still find it inadequate, you need to learn how to grow money. No one ever has been able to meet all his or her needs. It you cannot grow what you earn, you can never be self-sufficient. That is the kind of person who can govern a state.
ALSO READ Jimoh Ibrahim to attend World Bank/IMF ancillary meetings in Morocco
Passion for developing society
This is one of the areas society has been so unfair to Jimoh Ibrahim – not recognizing enough, his contributions to societal development. Here is someone who started giving out scholarships at the age of 25 and established the Jimoh Ibrahim Educational Foundation on his 30th birthday. Hundreds of youths he gave scholarship in Ondo State decades ago, are doing well contributing to the development of the society. In his native Ikaleland, there is hardly any community where he had not served as Chief Launcher during their community days and he donated generously in the past 27 years. In his Alma matter, Community Grammar School, Igbotako, he built an ultra-modern classroom with modern furnishing. JI believes the most impacting way to develop the people is through political governance. How many people and societies can you touch as a self-made billionaire? You will soon grow bankrupt! The best way to develop society is through governance! He has proved he can do this within six months as a Senator representing Ondo South Senatorial District. People wonder why he stresses himself trying to be governor (he is already wealthy) and his answer is that this is the best way he can fulfil his mission of positively developing the society.
Leadership capacity
Political leadership goes beyond the administration of resources. You have to have demonstrable capacity to secure lives and properties in the state. You must know how to manage people and resolve conflicts. A classic example of Ibrahim’s capacity in this regard is how he managed the leadership of Ondo State when late Governor Rotimi Akeredolu (God bless his soul) was very sick. As a serving senator, JI worked behind the scenes to ensure the state did not slip into anarchy. He started politics at 36 years of age when he vied for the governorship of Ondo State under the banner of an unknown political party in the state, All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP). He built the party from the scratch and elevated it into reckoning during a period the Alliance for Democracy was a religion in the South West and during which People’s Democratic Party controlled the Federal Government. He grew the party from nothing to something before Dr. Olusegun Agagu, whom he revered so much, persuaded him to join forces with him to build the state and he obliged and joined the PDP. Since he joined the APC, he has concentrated more of his energy in building the APC. “You cannot build people without building institutions,” he always says. When the Okitipupa Local Government Council was razed down by rioters, he spent millions of naira to rebuild the council. He helped to construct a befitting secretariat for the APC in the state. More importantly, JI is a bridge builder. He connects the young and old, politicians and non-politicians alike. Though very articulate and principled, he knows that in party politics, you must be a team player. He knows how to pick out leaders in the multitude and develop them. His leadership capacity is a huge asset for him when he becomes the leader of the party as governor of Ondo State. He is not someone who will destroy the party and heat up the polity through leadership incompetence.
High-level network
You must be highly-connected to be a successful governor in Nigeria. Which door can JI not knock on to get something for Ondo State? Is it that of the President, Vice President, Senate President, Speaker of the House of Representatives, fellow governors, corporate governors, International business institutions, or presidents of other countries? I once flew with him in his private jet to Ghana on a private visit and a motorcade took us from the Presidential Wing of the Accra Airport to where we lodged. When we flew together to Sao Tome & Principle Islands, it was the president of the oil-rich island who welcomed us. From Obas to Obis to Emirs, JI has open doors. It costs JI nothing to bring his fellow billionaires to come invest in Ondo State. He knows what they want and how they think because he too is a billionaire. He has been consultant to several international monetary institutions and knows how to network them to develop our beloved state.
High-level net worth
Jimoh Ibrahim is a billionaire. Recently, the National Universities Commission delegates who visited the University of Fortune that he established in his home town, Igbotako, remarked that some universities that are five to ten years old do not have the infrastructure he already had in place, even as the university has not taken off. Some people even joke that JI would be too expensive for Ondo State to maintain financially – someone who rides a car that costs over N250 million? The truth is that JI’s stupendous wealth does not get into his head. He is not coming into government to steal money to build houses. He built his first house in Igbotako and laid the foundation four houses same day, in Ikotun Egbe, Lagos at 24 years of age as a practicing lawyer. He owns more 15 houses in Victoria Garden City in Lagos and more than 40 plots of land in that estate alone before he marked his 30th birthday. How about his properties in Abuja, London, Dubai, and the United States? He is not a person coming to Ondo State to steal resources of the state. He has more than enough for a life time. When he says “Ondo State cannot maintain my status; I have to subsidize”, people say he is proud and arrogant. But that is just the simple truth.
Intellectual capacity
It’s not about the nine degrees he has (including three PhDs from first-class universities) that is even the issue here, for me. It is the uncommon quality of Jimoh Ibrahim to analyze and solve problems intellectually that is the issue. A good intellectual believes that every problem or challenge that exists must be systematically diagnosed for that problem or challenge to be resolved. What is the problem? Why does the problem occur or persist? How can the problem be solved? Medical doctors, for example, start solving health issues with diagnosis of the problem. They don’t start by prescribing medications. Once diagnosis is successfully done, solving the problem becomes very easy. He once asked: “Why, for example, are our tertiary institutions in Ondo State not being able to pay their salaries? The universities I attended do not rely on the government to pay their salaries! I don’t have an answer right now. But I will know why after doing thorough diagnosis and the solutions would come.” Without intellectual capacity, forget it. Your governor would just be dancing around issues if the issues do not consume him or her! An intellectual thinks ahead. Quality thinking! Lateef Jakande did not even attend any university. Yet he introduced free education and eradicated the shift system in Lagos secondary schools the very day he assumed office as governor. He established the Lagos State University! Jakande thought of the metro line and started it. It took an Asiwaju Tinubu protégé, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu 45 years after, to fulfill that vision (recently). It’s in intellectual thinking, which JI has in his DNA. “Good thinking, good product”, as the famous Toyota ad once ran.
Candor
Typical of most Ondo State citizens, JI calls a spade a spade. He is, in fact, too blunt for a politician. Ask many of his political followers: The greatest challenge they have with him is getting him to be “diplomatic”. He would not promise what he is not going to do just to deceive people and have his way. He boasts about his credentials. But when he is wrong, he admits. He believes a leader must confront the brutal facts at all times and that leadership problems in developing countries persist because many politicians think they must lie for people to believe them and vote them in. According to him “You cannot please the average human being; the same people who say ‘Adegun’ will also say ‘Adeogun’. So, find out what is best and just do it.”
I have conducted much research on leadership and found that most successful leaders have candor. The most enduring leaders have candor. Check it out.
Great strategist
We are not looking for a good governor in Ondo State. We are looking for a great governor. We are moving from “good” to “great”. To be that great governor, we need a great strategist. A strategist is someone who thinks about now in the context of a near future. A strategist does not carry his umbrella when he or she sees that the cloud is dark and it might rain. Like the British weather forecaster, he had known several days ahead that it would rain. Jimoh Ibrahim has skills and a passion for thinking outside the box. Like a great strategist that he is, he thinks in leaps; never in steps. His reasoning in 2024 is: “Where should Ondo State be in 2035 and what should be done right now for Ondo State to get to that preferred destination?” That is where to start the thinking process, even though he would have served out two terms as governor before 2035! JI does not like to take familiar routes. He takes the most viable routes, which are often not the familiar routes.
Bing in the right political party
Membership in a political party helps in successful governance. At the moment, the APC is being looked up to by Nigerians (under the leadership of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu) to revamp Nigeria. Jimoh Ibrahim took a wise decision by following the advice of his mentor, Arakunrin Rotimi Akeredolu to come over to the APC. President Bola Tinubu cannot transform Nigeria alone. He needs able governors that would serve as his arms and legs in the State. He needs someone who can interpret his visions and replicate it at state level, because he (the President) will always take much of the blames and praises for whatever happens in Nigeria. Belonging to the political party that controls the center is a big asset to a governor who would perform very well in office, with due respect to other political parties. I cannot under-emphasize this important requirement. The next phase of President Bola Tinubu’s transformation of Nigeria will come in handy through the states (just as Obafemi Awolowo did under the Unity Party of Nigeria from 1979-1983 with the LOOBO States – Lagos, Ondo, Ogun, Bendel, and Oyo States -) such that there will be synergy across APC states, unlike now that many states are doing as the “spirit of their governors direct”. Asiwaju Tinubu wants to replicate what he did through Fashola, Ambode, and Sanwo-Olu in all APC states. Jimoh Ibrahim is an Asiwaju Bola Tinubu protégé. He is already networking with the governors of Ekiti, Ogun and Lagos States, preparatory towards unfolding the Tinubu vision. It really matters who your leader is, because good leaders have great leaders. Ondo State needs a governor who can synergize with the President of the country. Jimoh Ibrahim fits in this regard.
On those Ten Cardinal Points, I urge my fellow citizens of Ondo State to rally round their distinguished citizen, Dr. Jimoh Folorunso Ibrahim, who is fully prepared to transform our beloved state. It starts with APC members giving him the party’s ticket in April. Let’s do it.
Dr. Folayan is a strategic communication scholar and publisher of Ikale News, Nigeria’s longest-running community newspaper.
