There are indications that the Speaker of Ogun State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Olakunle Oluomo, is allegedly working behind the scene to relocate the Moshood Abiola University of Science and Technology (MAUSTECH) to his hometown in Ifo Local Government area of Ogun State.
Sources close to Oluomo told DAILY POST that he had been ”pressing necessary buttons” to ensure that MAUSTECH, which is presently more or less without a location, is sited somewhere in Ifo.
The former Governor of Ogun State, Sen. Ibikunle Amosun, had in 2017 upgraded Moshood Abiola Polytechnic (MAPOLY) Abeokuta to MAUSTECH and relocated the polytechnic to Ipokia in Ogun West.
However, the two institutions could not take off before the exit of Amosun on May 28, 2019.
This was as a result of the different crises that characterised the planned relocation of lecturers of MAPOLY to Ogun State Polytechnic in Ipokia.
After his inauguration on May 29, the incumbent Governor Dapo Abiodun set up a committee to review the two institutions.
While the committee is yet to submit its report, Abiodun reversed Amosun’s policy on MAPOLY, with a bid to restore it to “status quo ante”.
A bill sent by Abiodun to the Ogun State House of Assembly for the amendment of the MAUSTECH Law to return all MAPOLY properties earlier ceded to the university back to the polytechnic, has been passed into law by the lawmakers.
This has since generated reactions from the Egbas, who accused Abiodun of working against their interest by allegedly planning to relocate the university outside Ogun Central.
Likewise, leaders of Ogun West, where the polytechnic was earlier relocated to, have also canvassed that the university be sited in Ipokia as the only public university in the region; adding that facilities are already in place for the take off of the university in Ipokia.
But in the heat of the controversies, Oluomo met with members of some Egba leaders, under the aegis of Abeokuta Club, to assure them that MAUSTECH would not be moved out of Abeokuta. He however did not add that both MAPOLY and MAUSTECH would coexist in the same Ojere campus in Abeokuta.
DAILY POST learnt that the Speaker had plans to ensure the university is not sited in Abeokuta, but in Ifo.
Our sources revealed that the Speaker was not pleased that all federal and state government institutions are being located in Abeokuta only; adding that Ifo and other communities under it are also part of Egbaland.
The Speaker, it was learnt, is leaving no stone unturned to press home his demands as he was said to have advised lawmakers from Ogun West to take their eyes off MAUSTECH and focus on making sure that Ogun State Polytechnic, Ipokia is not scrapped.
Recall that Oluomo played major roles in the upgrade of MAPOLY to MAUSTECH and the creation of Ogun State Polytechnic in Ipokia in 2017, being the Deputy Speaker of the eighth Ogun Assembly.
He represented the former Speaker, Rt. Hon. Suraj Adekunbi, at the stakeholders’ forum organised by the assembly before the passage of the laws establishing both MAUSTECH and Ogun State Polytechnic, Ipokia.
Meanwhile, the Speaker has denied telling anybody he was interested in moving the university to Ifo.
While he was asked by DAILY POST to react, Oluomo simply said, “I did not discuss that with anyone please.”
- DAILY POST
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