Human, Capital, Technology, and Physical Developments are continuous processes through which the standard of life and living of a society are daily appraised for the purpose of further improvement.
As we draw the curtains on our collective development achievements in the outgoing year 2025, it becomes imperative to explore new opportunities for advancing our development indices in the coming year 2026 and beyond, hence, the identification and recognition of the five broad frontiers through which I believe every individual in Ijesaland should find a space to actively participate in our onerous task of keeping Ijesaland ahead.
But before the five channels of development responses are unfolded, it is important to identify our pressing key development thematic areas of focus, namely: 1. Infrastructure Development
2. Industrialisation
3. Agriculture Development
4. Commerce Development
5. Educational Development
6. Health Services Development
7. Security Services Development
Our commitment as Ijesa in the 64 Wards and six LGAs in Ijesaland to pursue the prosecution of the noble development objectives listed above is not to usurp the statutory roles and responsibilities of the six LGAs, Osun State Government, and Federal Government to us in Ijesaland but rather to compliment these efforts of the three tiers of government. After all, the popular Yoruba adage says Eleru lo nkofe!
The extraordinary patriotic and altruistic emerging traits in Ijesaland in the last one year has encouragely favoured the proposal of these five windows of development opportunities and exploration for Ijesaland and which are now enumerated underneath.
A: IMPERIAL MAJESTY’S DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ADMINISTRATION
Our Imperial Majesty Owa Obokun Adimula and Paramount Ruler of Ijesaland, Owa Clement Adesuyi Haastrup the Ajimoko III has taken the bull by the horn to champion development drive in Ijesaland through the introduction and launching of an all-encompassing development initiatives in the last one year covering areas such as large scale agricultural programs and related value-chain linkages. This is in addition to mobilising and securing international collaboration and partnership for some of these programs.
Every Ijesa Son and Daughter owes Our Imperial Majesty a salutation for showing and displaying a Leadership By Example. I think it is history beckoning on His Imperial Majesty again! The reigns of Owa Ajimoko 1 & 11 have been recorded as monumental in various landmark development accomplishments. It is therefore natural to expect a superior supersonic monumental development from Our Imperial Majesty Owa Clement Adesuyi Haastrup the Ajimoko III in order to sustain the enviable legacy of the Ajimoko Ruling House in Ijesaland. To successfully achieve all the noble goals in the ambitious development programs of our Imperial Majesty, it is important to have in place a Management Team to support in the implementation. My considered opinion is that such an important development body be headed by an insider to the vision, namely the Ajirowa of Ijesaland, Chief Alhaji Lateef Akande Bakare. The eloquent, accomplished, and prosperous business industry background of Ajirowa Lateef Bakare is more than sufficient for him to draw other similarly outstanding, thriving, and flourishing Ijesa egg-heads, that are in large abundance, to join him in midwifing the delivery of Our Imperial Majesty Development Programs in Ijesaland. What a wonderful opportunity for Ajirowa Lateef Bakare to offer Ijesaland the professional expertise that he has ceaselessly offered the different tiers of government and communities across Nigeria for over four decades.
B: IJESA DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL (IDC) The IDC is strategically positioned to mobilise ALL the 47 Development Bodies under its umbrella for the industrialisation of Ijesaland as its major task and vision. The IDC could articulate appropriate strategies to harness our various resources and mobilise all strategic Stakeholders in Ijesaland to deliver on fresh and new industries, such as medium and large scale industries, to compliment the over 50-year old International Brewery in Ijesaland. IDC is already constituted and populated by eminent Ijesas under the dynamic leadership of Sir Ezekiel Olasupo Shadiya. Sir Shadiya, is not only a successful giant player in the industrial landscape of Nigeria but also possesses the global networks required to facilitate, coordinate, and re-positioning Ijesaland in the global industrial map. It is most cheering and applauding to read in the acceptance speech of his second term of three years that the industrialisation of Ijesaland shall be the main business of the IDC in the next three years. We certainly cannot be luckier in Ijesaland with the avowed declaration and determination driven by uncommon patriotism to our land. We all owe IDC a duty to be ready to support this highly desired vision of industrialising Ijesaland in our own life time.
C: IJESA COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ASSEMBLY (ICDA)
The ICDA is primarily established to mobilise Ijesa Sons and Daughters in providing social infrastructure, projects, and programs that are conceived and designed to enhance the socioeconomic status of Ijesaland.The ICDA has successfully established an acceptable development brand in the last six years. Some of its flagship projects and programs such as the Owa’s Palace; Geriatric Hospital; University of Ilesa; FSCT Youth Scholarship Program; Youth Development Leventis Foundation Agricultural Training Partnership; RLG Partnership on Youth Communication Technology Training; and Health Insurance Scheme for the Elderlies have assisted it to achieve this milestone thus far. Its current introduction of Ijesaland Development Fund (IDF) is expected to provide a decentralised, sustainable financial structure and platform. The two layers of management comprising the Board of Trustees and Management Team under the leadership of Asiwaju Yinka Fasuyi have sustained the brand to date. In the coming weeks, plans are in the offing to create and establish a separate Management Structure with full executive responsibilities to handle the day to day running of the IDF while the ICDA Board of Trustees and Management Team shall be providing the oversight responsibilities.
D: IWUDE IJESA SOCIETIES’ DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS The enthusiasm with which Ijesas both at home and in the diaspora have imbibed and accepted the new Iwude Ijesa Unity Festival is unprecedented and for which the leadership of both Chief Afolabi Igbaroola and Alagba Wale Idowu must be given the deserved commendation.As the Chairman of the maiden edition of the Iwude Ijesa Unity Festival in December 2024, I, Asiwaju Olayinka Fasuyi emphasized in my address at the Carnival Ground at Ilesa Grammar School of the need to use the Annual Iwude Ijesa Festival not to only display and promote our Cultural potentials but to also make it mandatory for all the participating Ijesa Societies and Clubs to embark on one development project or the other in any of our communities in the 64 Wards and six LGAs in Ijesaland as a mark of giving back to the society and make it the hallmark of their respective yearly celebrations. Currently we have over 60 Ijesa Societies and Clubs that participated in the 2025 edition and you could imagine 60 projects such as Rehabilitation of one block of Primary or Secondary School; Rehabilitation of Community Health Center; Drilling of Borehole for Water Provision in a Rural Community; Provision of Solar Electricity in a Rural Community; Fixing of Rural Roads; Hiring and Payment of School Teachers; Provision of Teaching Aids in Schools; Organizing Medical Outreach; Digital Training for Community Youth; Construction of Community Recreation Center; etc.
If 60 Societies and Clubs do this every year, Ijesaland shall become the new Mecca of development by the year 2030 which is just another five years from now.
For instance, from the 2026 Iwude Ijesa Unity Festival edition, the brochure shall list out all the participating Societies and Clubs alongside their respective community projects, location, costs, impacts, etc.
So as the Societies and Clubs are competing in fashion, ornaments, culture, parade colors, before and after Iwude Parties, they are also competing in impacts on humanity through the touching of lives achieved from their respective community projects. Thank God, I am aware that two of the Societies namely Diamond Ladies of Adimula and Egbe Yeye Gbobaluyi Adimula Ijesaland have started this.
I am of the conviction that in a space of five to ten years, the entire communities in Ijesaland shall be littered with one development intervention or the other and which would turn Ijesaland into another development lesson society worth emulating by other development-thirst communities in Yorubaland and Nigeria.The Iwude Ijesa celebration would therefore become another sustainable development-driven response.The Iwude Ijesa Planning Committee would therefore be required to step up on their inspection and monitoring of the projects delivered by the various Societies and Clubs in order to ensure that fair records of performance are captured and reported in the yearly Brochure of Iwude Ijesa Unity Festival.
E: NEW DEVELOPMENT BODIES
I have identified three categories of New Development Bodies for the consideration of all stakeholders in Ijesaland, which if explored could sustainably add value to our continuous development in Ijesaland.
1. ALMA MATA SCHOOL DEVELOPMENT
Most if not all of us hold strong emotional attachments to the Schools we attended and finished from. Sadly, many of these schools are in a state of dilapidation with varying degrees of infrastructure decay. Every Primary and Secondary Schools in Ijesaland should be encouraged to have a functional Old Students Associations. And the primary objective of the Schools’ Old Students Associations would be to either annually or bi-annualy give back something, no matter how little, to the school as a way of contributing to the development of Ijesaland. Let each Old Students Associations relate to the School they claim to be representing by at least having one visit to the school in every academic session. Engage the School Management, give career talks and mentoring to the students; and motivate the school workers.
For the active Schools’ Old Students Associations, I say Kudos to the likes of Ilesa Grammar School Old Students Associations; Methodist High School Old Students Associations; Atakumosa High School Old Students Associations; Ijebu-jesa Grammar School Old Students Associations; and Ibokun High School Old Students Associations. Please pardon me if yours is active and not listed. We should replicate this at our elementary schools such as Cappa Elementary School; Iloro School A & B; Omofe School A & B; Otapete Methodist Primary School Ilesa, Salvation Army Primary School, etc.
Where your school is no longer in existence, please adopt a school and contribute to its annual development.
Each community Traditional Ruler in Ijesaland is admonished to personally look into following up the actualisation of this strategy to salvage and enhance our educational system in Ijesaland. For Ilesa Metropolis, the Ward Chiefs are encouraged to take this responsibility to advance the cause of their jurisdiction. Every patriotic Ijesa Son and Daughter is also advised to take immediate steps to participate in the welfare of his or her alma mata.
2: WARD TERRITORY AND CHIEFS DEVELOPMENT RESPONSIBILITY
Over the years, our Traditional Institutions have been asking for constitutional roles and responsibilities in the polity. Very soon, the Federal Government may be acceding to this request. But before then, it is high time that our various categories of traditional institutions are saddled with development deliverables within the capabilities and capacities of their respective jurisdiction.
It is high time the Ward Chiefs take some basic responsibilities such as providing security for lives and properties within their respective localities. This is not asking them to take over the job of community policing but rather employ their native intelligence and mastery of their local jurisdiction to engage the inhabitants of their respective neighborhoods in generating information about the residents of their respective localities. Be actively involved in who lives in your jurisdiction, hold regular Ward/Street Meetings; Carry out Environmental Sanitation of your areas; Provide leadership within your community or Ward or Street.
Hold the Traditional Institutions accountable for what goes on within their respective vicinity. Enough of passing the buck!
Community Traditional Rulers to hold at least a monthly meeting to review happenings and performances in each Street, Ward, and Community.Through this we build an all-inclusive development response. The concept of Know Your Customer (KYC) should apply in every Street, Ward, District, and Community where the Head of the Street,Ward, District, Community is the Agency and the residents are the Customers. As it is applicable in the Banks, we can adapt same for the local security of our communities in Ijesaland.
3. NEW INITIATIVES
The Development Of Ijesaland Is The Sustainable Responsibility Of All Ijesas
If for any reason one does not fancy any of the alternative development windows listed above, one will be at liberty to either act independently or within a new group to champion a new development cause and they will be rest assured to receive the blessing of Obokun.
Every living Ijesa Son and Daughter is obligated to be responsible for the development of Ijesaland except where one is resource-vulnerable.
CONCLUSION
In summary, the respective performances from the various development responses above are to be collated at the 64 Wards and in the six LGAs for periodic reporting, comparative performance reviews, and production of Annual Ijesaland Development Performance Records.The annual publication of such Ijesaland Development Performance Records could be made to coincide with the Annual Iwude Ijesa Unity Festival where Ijesa Sons and Daughters across the world are at home in a celebration mood.With the introduction and launching of these development roadmaps, it would be possible to start developing a new set of values, norms, and ethics peculiar to Ijesaland and chart a legacy that we bequeath to several generations after us.Very soon, our people shall be demanding from those canvassing for their electoral votes of their verifiable evidence of leadership by example through their respective participation in at least two of the various windows listed above.
Whoever does not have a role or responsibility in any of these His Imperial Majesty Project; IDC Project; ICDA Project; Iwude Ijesa Societies and Clubs Project; Street and Ward Project; Schools Old Students Associations Project; or New Initiative Projects certainly does not deserve anyone’s vote because such a candidate will end up being a liability to Ijesaland without any value addition to our development.The moment we all cultivate this culture, we shall soon begin to raise a new set of Ijesa Leaders whom we shall all be proud to succeed our generation.
An holistic pursuit of the development roadmaps above in conjunction with other strategies that our other illustrious, enterprising, and brilliant minds could add will certainly birth a new dawn of development towards supporting the reign of Our Imperial Majesty to be the most remarkable, purposeful, impactful, and rewarding ever experienced in the history of Ijesaland.
Happy First Anniversary To Our Imperial Majesty Owa Obokun Adimula and Paramount Ruler of Ijesaland Owa Clement Adesuyi Haastrup the Ajimoko III
L’aiye Ajimoko III Ire La Nwa Ire Ire La Nri Ire!
May the Almighty God bless and prosper your reign Our Imperial Majesty!
Asiwaju Yinka Fasuyi
The Asiwaju Of Ijesaland
The Chairman, ICDA
Oke Baba Okuta Villa, Ilesa
29th December, 2025
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