By ADEYEMI ADELEYE

A Lagos PDP chieftain, Dr Abdul-Azeez Adediran, on Friday berated Gov. Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s failure to immortalise late former governor Lateef Jakande, one year after death.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that Jakande, who served as first executive governor of the state between 1979 and 1983, died on Feb, 11, 2021 at the age of 91.

Adediran, in a statement issued in Lagos by his Press Secretary, Mr Kazeem Bakare, said Jakande served the state meritoriously than most of the politician governors after him.

“Today marks a year anniversary of the demise of the first Executive Governor of Lagos state, Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande.

“Jakande’s indelible mark spans education, housing, road infrastructure, health, housing, among others.

“There is no gainsaying the fact that Jakande represents an institution which any occupant of the office at the Lagos House, Alausa should eternally immortalise.

“It is rather unfortunate that the state would not think of something in that regard for a hero of Jakande’s stature, as a mark of his immortalisation,” Adediran, Lagos4Lagos Movement Lead Visioner, said.

According to him, in the area of housing, Jakande’s legacy in low cost housing estates in Abesan, Isolo and other parts of Lagos State, have become a benchmark for affordable housing by any government, decades after the launch of the scheme.

Adediran described Sanwo-Olu’s recent naming of a health centre in Amuwo-Odofin after Sen. Oluremi Tinubu as an “executive recklessness and insensitivity”.

He said that such development had continued across the state as many state edifices were either named after Sen. Bola Tinubu or his wife or his daughter by office holders.

Adediran said: “We would like to remind the governor that a hero like Lateef Kayode Jakande deserves more than he is getting in a state he meritoriously served till he breathed his last.

“A befitting immortalisation is not too much to ask for a state and national hero.

“Our state is blessed with present and past heroes that have laid the foundation for the Lagos of today and come 2023, under a PDP led administration, the labour of our present and past heroes, shall not be in vain.”

He restated commitment and readiness of the movement to birth a Lagos that would work for everyone come 2023. (NAN)

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