Further to my piece of January 25, a more troubling and deliberate pattern has emerged in Ondo State’s governance trajectory, the active dismantling and liquidation of the legacies of past administrations. The founding fathers of the state, particularly during the Adekunle Ajasin era and under his immediate successors, were intentional in reserving land, forests, housing estates, and strategic urban spaces for long-term public use and future government infrastructure.
These assets were not incidental acquisitions. They were products of foresight, discipline, and a clear understanding that development is cumulative and intergenerational. Today, many of these legacies are being demolished, deforested, subdivided, or sold off at ridiculous prices, often to political cronies, family members, and individuals with privileged access to power.
A striking illustration of this politics of liquidation is the fate of Owena Hotel, once a symbol of state pride and tourism potential. Under the Mimiko administration, the hotel was demolished, and the land bifurcated. One part was converted into a shopping mall, with the projection that the other part would be for modern hospitality business, to preserve the legacy. Successive governments have since gone on to sell off the remaining portions to political associates at prices that bear no reasonable relationship to their true economic, strategic, or historical value.
What should have been upgraded into a flagship hospitality and conference hub has instead been reduced to fragmented private holdings, reflecting a governance culture that prioritizes immediate private enrichment over enduring public value.
Equally disturbing is the quiet but systematic appropriation of strategic government land reserves.
The vast expanse of land behind The Dome in Akure was deliberately set aside to accommodate future government infrastructure, ministries, institutions, and public utilities essential for a growing state capital. That long-term vision has now been completely abandoned. The land has been carved into plots and allocated to politicians, their families, and allies within the corridors of power.
The implication is grave and potentially irreversible. Ondo State is steadily mortgaging its future and eroding its capacity to plan, expand, and respond to future governance demands. Environmental heritage has also fallen victim to this assault on public assets.
The Agricultural Forest Reserve at Adegbemile, popularly known as Omi-Eja, stands as a painful and instructive example. Preserved since the creation of Ondo State as a conservation area and one of the very few remaining green spaces in Akure, Omi-Eja has recently been subjected to large-scale deforestation for timber extraction.
On December 18, Professor Olugbenga Oke-Samuel of the Faculty of Law, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, publicly drew the attention of the state government to this development in a widely circulated Facebook post. He described the deforestation of Omi-Eja as “a shameful and uncivilized act” and questioned how a government that receives international grants to combat climate change could permit commercial logging in the heart of its capital.
He warned that such actions run contrary to global standards on conservation and sustainability adopted through the United Nations and urged Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa to immediately cancel all permits relating to the commercialization of the reserve.
Perhaps the most emblematic expression of this destructive trajectory is the impending demolition of key public housing assets built under the administration of Chief Adekunle Ajasin. The government quarters at Alagbaka, Akure, alongside the housing estate in Ala Quarters, were designed to support a professional, stable, and dignified public service by providing affordable accommodation for civil servants.
These estates have now been marked for demolition, instead of upgrade, with credible indications that the lands will be allocated to politicians and sold in parts to cronies at grossly undervalued rates. When combined with the wholesale allocation of virtually all vacant prime government lands in Alagbaka to individuals close to power, the message becomes unmistakable.
The state is consuming its inheritance. This is not renewal, it is liquidation. It is governance that eats its seed corn and leaves future generations poorer, constrained, and deprived of the foundational assets required for meaningful development.
At its core, this unfolding pattern represents a profound failure of public trusteeship. Government holds land, forests, and public infrastructure not as private property to be traded at will, but as assets held in trust for present and future citizens. Once these assets are sold, allocated, or destroyed, they are lost forever.
Ondo State’s tragedy is not merely that it is failing to build new legacies, but that it is actively dismantling the ones it inherited. History will not judge administrations by the number of allocations made or plots shared, but by whether they preserved, strengthened, or squandered the commonwealth entrusted to them.
As Ondo State looks forward to the 2028 governorship election cycle, the path to getting it right must begin with a clear rejection of this politics of liquidation. Voters must look beyond slogans, zoning, and patronage networks, and instead interrogate candidates on their commitment to public trusteeship, institutional continuity, and long-term planning.
The next governor must demonstrate not just ambition, but restraint, not just innovation, but respect for inherited public assets. Ondo State does not need another allocator-in-chief. It needs a steward of its commonwealth, one prepared to halt asset stripping, restore planning discipline, protect environmental and housing legacies, and rebuild a governance culture anchored in intergenerational responsibility.
Only then can future anniversaries be marked not by lamentation over lost inheritance, but by confidence in a state that chose preservation over plunder and vision over venality.
Wale Obanigba, a lawyer writes from Akure, the capital of Ondo State
