Nigeria: Under my leadership, Lagos was transformed from a jungle to a megacity.
Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential candidate, has recalled how he transformed Lagos State from a jungle to a megacity during his tenure as governor.
Tinubu made this statement in a mini-documentary that aired on Channels Television on Friday, October 14, 2022.
Tinubu ruled Lagos from 1999 to 2007, during which time the state witnessed some of the current developments.
The former two-term Governor of Lagos claimed credit for laying the state’s development foundation, which his successors have continued to build upon to make the state what it is today.
The presidential candidate makes the bold claim that Lagos truly came alive under his leadership.
“When I became governor of Lagos State in 1999, Lagos was a jungle,” Tinubu said. It was a completely barbaric environment. There were garbage dumps everywhere, schools with no roofs, and hospitals without ambulances or oxygen tanks to save lives. It was in terrible condition.
“We started to put things in place gradually and the state began to take shape. What we did was to take the liabilities in the state and convert them to assets.
“Civic Centre to Oriental Hotel areas of Victoria Island were back then refuse dumps, but look at what the areas have turned to today. It is only the older ones who would remember all these.”
According to the mini-documentary, Tinubu restructured the state’s revenue and made Lagos financially self-sufficient when he left government in 2007.
It went on to say that under Tinubu’s leadership, Lagos went from being solely dependent on federal allocations prior to 1999 to becoming an autonomous state.
According to the documentary, “when Tinubu took over in 1999, Lagos was bankrupt.” At the time, the state’s internal revenue was N600 million per month, and it was entirely dependent on the Federal Government.
“When Tinubu was leaving office in 2007, the IGR of Lagos was N7bn monthly. Babatunde Fashola built on that legacy to N15bn monthly. This was made possible by the short, medium and long-term goals that Tinubu laid down for the state in terms of revenue and wealth generation.”
In a brief clip from the mini-documentary, President Muhammadu Buhari stated that Tinubu’s political acumen drew him (Buhari) to the former Lagos state governor.
Buhari’s word: “Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has set himself apart as a political strategist and a mountain of ideas which drew me to him. He is a true humanitarian and has contributed immensely to the success of Nigeria and Africa.”
Former governor of the state, Babatunde Fashola, and the incumbent, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, were also featured in the documentary, and both credited the APC presidential candidate for the majority of the projects that their administrations completed.
They referred to Tinubu as the architect of modern development in Lagos, noting that his efforts paved the way for most of the developments long before they arrived.
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