Grandiose Parlor

If you are an indigene of Ondo State, Nigeria, or a web enthusiast, you need to read this:

Late last year, the government of Ondo State decided to add a ‘public forum‘ to the government web portal. Today what appeared to be a genuine gesture of engaging the people of the state has turned to an exercise that runs contrary to every known standard and ethics of information exchange and principles of citizen media, particularly if when it is funded with peoples money.

I have heard of postings been edited or deleted when their contents are contrary to what the PDP government of Dr Agagu wants. I didn’t pay much attention until I asked a friend - ‘Segun’, to test the fairness of the Ondo State forum administrators.

Segun went ahead and posted on forum highlighting the “double talk” of Governor Agagu. As it was reported in the media, Agagu partly fumbled the Nigerian integrated power project while serving as the Mines and Power Minister by awarding contracts to dozens of unregistered companies. Segun contrasted that report with a recent statement the governor made to the members of the House of Representatives Committee on Power and Steel when they paid him a visit. Agagu was reported to have “advised them to engage the services of professionals to look into the award of contracts, identify and remove bottle necks and punish whoever erred.”

Within 48hours, Segun’s post was edited, and as I write this post all that remains (url: http://www.ondostate.gov.ng/forum2.php?id=79 ) is this:

Forum » Agagu Talks Tough On Power Sector … Condemns Turbines Lying Idle at Port. (Apr 15,’08)
posted by segun (Apr 15, ‘08)
Here is url of the article [ http://www.ondostate.gov.ng/news_details.php?id=1651 ]as posted on this site, below is an excerpt: Members of the House of Representatives Committee on Power and Steel have been tasked to design, without further delay a roadmap for the consummation of all the power projects to the level of completion in the country while their investigation continues. Governor Olusegun Agagu of Ondo State who gave the charge also enjoined the Committee on Power and Steel to be sincere in their final recommendations to the Federal Government in view of the fact that the sector was vital to the economic emancipation of Nigeria. He made the appeal on Thursday in Akure while receiving the committee members who were in the state on a fact finding tour of Federal Government’s projects in the state. Agagu advised them to engage the services of professionals to look into the award of contracts, identify and remove bottle necks and punish whoever erred.

Segun went back and logged yet another post, addressed to the administrator, asking why his post was edited. The second post lasted less than one week before it was deleted from the board. We made that discovery shortly before I decided to write this post.

I’m sure there are other similar instances of abusive and reckless administrative practices on the Ondo State web forum that have gone undocumented - a forum paid for by state funds.

It is on record that Segun questioned the idea and purpose of the forum when it went live. The questions posed to the administrator can be found at this url: http://www.ondostate.gov.ng/forum2.php?id=12, and are reproduced below:

If I may guess, this is to seek input from the users - presumably Ondo State people. While I understand the need to source input from the people, I doubt if a forum is the best tool to do this. The people ought to be educated that where their voices would be heard, or needed to be heard, and is most relevant is at the state House of Assembly (well, if they can manage to dodge the fist cuffs there.) Even if the forum succeeds in attracting relevant and well articulated discussions, it remains unclear how the input will be processed and passed on to the relevant entities for further action, or our suggestions offered here will aid public policy and governance in general. As far as I know, forums have not been used on any public and state-funded web domain in any democratic society. Check, I may be wrong. So why in Ondo state? Can the brains behind this project shed more light to this forum experiment? The bottom-line is giving the people of Ondo state good governance, how does this forum speak to that?

Going by the responses to that post- there has yet to be a well articulated answer to Segun’s questions.

While it is not strange - albeit ethically wrong - for government-owned traditional media outlets (radio and TV in particular) to be used to propagate political propaganda, it is disturbing that Ondo State, under Dr Agagu, has extended this whacked mentality to new media disguised in the form of a “public forum”.

It is a slap on the faces of the global people of Ondo State that the administration of Dr Agagu deems it fit to use any means necessary to justify its stay in power, even if it means misinforming the people via a state-funded public internet forum full of doctored contents!

This action can only be orchestrated by a criminally-minded and socially irresponsible bunch. But as recent events have shown - via the Ondo State electoral tribunal and investigation of the integrated power project - one can see why only those kind of people can see any leadership traits in the state executive, in the person of Dr Agagu!