Governor of Oyo State, Seyi Makinde, has recommended a single term of five or six years for elected public officials.
Speaking when Muslim delegation, led by deputy governor Bayo Lawal visited him at his Ibadan residence shortly after the Eid-el-Kabir prayers, , Makinde said based on his experience, elected officials are only serious with governance for five years out of the eight years in office.
The governor, who has been in office for six years, said there are always distractions of re-election campaigns, adding that a single term will remove such distractions.
“First, let me use this opportunity to say Barka Da Sallah to our Muslim faithful and we shall have the opportunity to celebrate many more by the grace of God,” he said.
“I was just looking at the trajectory for me in government. I have spent six years already and due to no fault of anybody, we lost the year 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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“We lost almost one year, campaigning all over the place for the second tenure. Now, people have started distracting us on what I want to do next and all of that.
“So, I feel that, effectively, the time we can say we are very serious with governance is just about five out of the eight years.
“That is why I feel if you remove all these distractions, a single tenure of five or six years is actually enough to focus and do the work that we are trying to do in eight years.
“Well, we shouldn’t be afraid to say the facts based on data that is available to us. It has nothing to do with me. If they say I should end it, so be it.
“So, I am just calling the attention of our people to this because it is a constitutional issue.
“We should start looking at it. I know that it has been brought to the attention of the national assembly but, quite frankly, it is a model that should work for this country.”
