The assumption of office by His Excellency, Alhaji Yahaya Adoza Bello as the 4th Executive Governor of Kogi State on the 27th of January 2016 effectively ushered in the ‘New Direction Administration’ and a new dawn for Kogi State.
which deprived the State and her people of many dividends of democracy, Governor Yahaya Bello has managed to change the narrative positively by delivering significant development strides in all sections of the State through the judicious utilization of the State’s limited resources.
The Government that he led in the last eight years was young and strong, leadership. He governed by a set of globally recognized principles measurable and scalable.
The use of the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) developed by the United Nations/ Oxford University Poverty and Human Development Initiative (UN/OPHI) and the In the last eight (8) years, the Governor Yahaya Bello-led New Direction Administration has carefully implemented plans and programs to put the state on the path of sustainable growth and development whilst overcoming several challenges and constraints.
So far, Kogi State has come a mighty long way from the pervasive dysfunction inherited by the Yahaya Bello-administration in 2016.
Despite the failings of the past Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to build the New Direction Blueprint (NBT) gave access to tools which already incorporated global best practices for governance.
An active implementation framework driven by the New Direction Blueprint Team gave unusual clarity on Training, Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation (TIME) of his plans.
In the First Term (2016 – 2019) his agenda for the state was hinged on five (5) thematic areas of Education, Health, Job Creation & Youth Engagement, Infrastructure & Utilities, and Public Service & Pension Reforms.
These were further expanded to nine (9) thematic areas in the Second Term (2019 – 2024) of his administration with the addition of Agriculture, Human Capital Development, Entrepreneurship & Youth Engagement, Security as well as Cooperation and Integration (the Socio-cultural Agenda) to the existing five thematic areas.
There is plenty of evidence that what he has accomplished in this administration has helped to leapfrog progress in the state today. This has not happened by chance. Not at all.
He came into Office with a well-defined Blueprint and massive political will to make positive change – and he has done precisely that.
Today, it could be proven that he has made impressive efforts to reposition Kogi State for the future.
This has the direct effect of enhancing the citizen’s abilities to take advantage of their vast endowments in human and other natural resources for development purposes. characterized which by were By making security of lives and properties a constant priority, Governor Yahaya Bello has placed Kogi State in a great position to attract and keep new residents and investments in her economy by getting rid of criminals and making Kogi State a safe haven for her people and other Nigerians plying the highways between the North and the South of the country through her territory.
The education sector has also received topnotch attention from his government. There has been significant improvement in human capital development indices from basic through tertiary education levels and through targeted programmes in the vocational and informal education sub-sectors.
His administration has founded new schools including two state-owned universities, the Confluence University of Science & Technology (CUSTECH), Osara and the Kogi State University (KSU), Kabba.
He also renovated, and in many cases reconstructed, physical and non-physical infrastructure in all the state’s existing tertiary institutions.
He also improved access to educational opportunities, school enrollment and retention numbers and the performance of students in both internal and external examinations.
Furthermore, It is important to note that since the last strike by university lecturers about 7 years ago, Students in Kogi State Tertiary Institutions have enjoyed uninterrupted academic calendars.
The result is that Kogi undergraduates have advanced at least 2 to 3 years ahead of their contemporaries in other schools who continue to be bedeviled by pernicious industrial actions in this all important sector.
The Health Sector has grown exponentially under Governor Yahaya Bello’s careful management. Hundreds of Primary Healthcare Centres in Kogi have been renovated and ultramodern secondary and tertiary hospitals are springing up across the three Senatorial Districts.
They are all equipped with State of the art equipment. The Kogi State Health Insurance Agency is fully set up and has absorbed tens of thousands of citizens under her free to subsidized healthcare policies. Gradually, Kogi State is becoming the Health Tourism destination that his goal envisioned.
Heavy investments have been made in roads, bridges and other civil engineering infrastructure all over the state including the now completed and commissioned first flyover and interchange in Kogi State at Ganaja junction.
This has helped to improve the quality of life available in Lokoja metropolis, major towns and rural areas. Good governance across board with respect to equity in political appointments, with deliberate policies of inclusion for women (45%) and persons living with special needs) has been embedded by the administration of Governor Yahaya Bello.
These success stories are, to a great extent, replicated in agriculture, the Civil Service and other sectors. In a bid to alleviate poverty and to take his vision of pulling one million Kogi youths above the poverty line, he approved the establishment of the Kogi State Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation in December 2023.
This he said will enable Kogi State to integrate seamlessly into the overarching vision of the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu encapsulated in the Renewed Hope agenda which aims to uplift 50 million Nigerians from poverty annually. For the first time perhaps, the presence of Government is felt by the widest cross-section of Kogites under one administration.
This 8th Referral Compendium showcases how Governor Bello’s Mission Statement (To develop Kogi State into Nigeria’s foremost and most secure emerging commercial hub through optimization of the State’s geographical location, natural endowments and human resources for a sustainable future) has dovetailed nicely into his implementation strategies.
Success without a successor, they say, is failure.
He remained committed to moving Kogi State forward as aggressively as possible within the ambits of the overarching governance objectives by ensuring that having laid a foundation for rapid development, the task of consolidation and continuity falls to people who are versed in the New Direction ideologies and practices, hence the election of Alhaji Usman Ahmed Ododo and Mr. Joel Oyibo Salifu as the next Governor and Deputy Governor of Kogi State respectively.
This Referral Compendium will unfold under the following components:
1. Leadership & Governance.
2. A Review of the New Direction Administration’s Performance using the Global Standards Index
3. An xray of the Legacies of the New Direction Administration.
Moses Okezie-Okafor, ESQ.
Director General Research and Development
Click any of the images below to view the detailed Compendium document.
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