ABEOKUTA— The Former Managing Director of the Ogun State Property and Investment Corporation (OPIC), Barr. Babajide Odusolu has decry the state of Mitros Residence Hotel, Abeokuta, one of the assets left by the immediate past administration of Sen. Ibikunle Amosun.
Odusolu made this known Tuesday while been grilled for about 6hours by the Ogun State House of Assembly through its Committee on Public Account and anti-corruption, at the Assembly Complex, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta.
A dissatisfied Odusolu said, “Am not happy with a lot of things going on now. This is because, Sen. Ibikunle Amosun is a visionary. When he brought somebody like me on board, I was the first private sector person that was made an MD of OPIC.
“When he bought me onboard, it was with a simple mandate ‘turn the place around and make it profitable’, and that’s what we did”
“We made Mitros Residence Hotel possible under two months in readiness for the South West Governor’s Conference. We also left it as a business venture of the government with it’s own management, making profits
“My colleagues in OPIC knew that I didn’t see them as civil servants. I saw them first and first as history makers, so am not happy about Mitros, and am not happy about alot of things.
Odusolu, who reeled out the various housing projects carried out by the corporation under his purview, however appreciated the lawmakers for the opportunity to clarify issues and outline his scorecard during the period under review, positing that the Corporation needed to run like an independent business enterprise, which should be devoid of the public service scrutiny, rules and processes.
According to him, the Corporation started from the stage where it hardly made profit in 2013 when he took over, till it broke even as profit oriented corporation as at 2019.
“Government must see and allow OPIC to operate with flexibility as a business. If you want to force us to do the things like they do in the past, you will go back to the old ways. When I was here, we had targets, every months, everybody had targets
“When you take a business and try and funnel it into the details of civil service, you will always have conflicts
“Look at Orange Valley, look at Kings Court. Kings Court is viable today, simply because in 2014 and 2015, we moved about 16,700 trips of latrite to fill that place and reclaim it, that’s why there is value there
“Look at New Makun, look at MTR Gardens, and even Agbara, though work didn’t finish but we did the best we can. So, my plea to the current administration is to unshackle OPIC, and the leadership they put in OPIC and allow it to actually run”
“Within a 6 years period, we turn around OPIC and generated over N18.7billion in revenue and the total expenditure we made was about N12.3billion.
“You will probably say, where are the rest investments? They are all over the place. The reason OPIC Continue to thrive today is because all those Investments, we left them there. We left land in New Makun, we left land in Agbara that is viable, we left lands in MTR Gardens that is viable and houses everywhere, that is what OPIC is still surviving on until today”
“The worth of all the assets we left in OPIC is worth a N40b enterprise” he added
