BY CHUKWU JOEL CHINEDU
The Reappointment of Mrs Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire as the Senior Special Assistant to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Sustainable Development Goals has sparked different comments and sentimental reactions from Nigerians.
Prior to her appointment, a lot of petitions have trailed the rumours of her being considered for re-appointment by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu due to the fact that nobody has ever been re-appointed to that position since the creation of the Office of the Senior Special Assistant on Sustainable Development Goals (OSSAP-SDGS) and more, so she had served eight years during the administration of former president Muhammadu Buhari.
It was gathered that in the buildup to the re-appointment, different interests evolved from different geopolitical zones with lobbyists recruited to do the leg work for them in the Presidency and Tinubu was on cross road, but the support received by different state political leaders of the All Progressive Congress (APC) landed the former Deputy Governor of Lagos State the job, particularly with her landmark achievements as SSAP-SDGS to former President Muhammadu Buhari and in the spirit of continuity of completing OSSAP-SDGs projects scattered across Nigeria.
It is on record that over 4,000 projects were done during her tenure as the OSSAP-SDGs boss between 2016-2023 in different sectors such as Health, Education, Empowerment, Infrastructure, Agriculture and food Security. The president was taken aback by these achievements which can be physically verified across the nation.
This may not however be connected with the plan of President Tinubu to domicile all constituency projects of the National Assembly members to OSSAP-SDGS for the purpose of accountability and transparency for Nigerians to enjoy dividends of democracy.
A human rights activist, Dr Ojei Nelson described the SDGs as a vehicle that can deliver social investments to the citizens as it is being done in advanced countries.
“As the baby of the United Nations if SDGs Nigeria is functional with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals, poverty will be a thing of the past but in Nigeria, I think our operators have to buckle their belts and re-engineer the OSSAP-SDGS operations with a serious focus on its agenda 2030,” Nelson said.