Tuesday, January 27, 2026, His Excellency, Ahmed Usman Ododo will be marking his second year in Office as the Fifth Executive Governor of Kogi State.
Considering every index of good governance which essence is the wholesome delivery of democratic dividends, the kind that when it gladdens the heart of the citizens they will comprehensively pass a vote of confidence in their leader, saying:
“Men and women, the young and the old, the aborigines and the settlers, Christians, Muslims and animists, nearly all of us in this State, sentiments and ill will apart, know in the deepest recesses of our hearts that this man is simply good. In fact, this Governor is basically the ABC of good governance. Pure and simple.”
In the area of the provision of infrastructural facilities and other Socio-economic and political developments, Governor Ahmed Usman Ododo can not be said to have failed the electorates on whose crest he climbed to be in the saddle of leadership in the last two years. If he continues with this pace of equitably developing the State, his eight years of two tenures will go into the annals of Kogi State governance history as the most loving and lovely in terms of performance, peacefulness, pacifism, empathy, sensitivity and people-friendliness.
What is most amazing to the people about Governor Ododo is his humane and humble disposition. He has so much simplified governance in the State that many people now wonder if he knows the enormous powers he wields as Executive Governor. Apart from God and President, Governors are the most powerful people in this country called Nigeria. “Why then is Ododo handling governance as if he does not know that, like a lion in its prime, he carries savage paws and beastly jaws with which he could pounce, maul, devour and obliterate his enemies from the surface of our planet earth.” People wonder.
I think his answer, if asked such question directly, would have been that it would diminish his humanity and upbringing to liken his behaviour to the savagery that reigns in the kingdom of animals like lions, leopards, tigers, pythons, puff adders, clamping claws and other beastly members of the wild which pride themselves as merchants of fear, sorrows, blood-letting and deaths.
Ododo knows the difference between man and animals which is why he has made humility and simplicity as the hallmark of his own brand of administration. His government is giving comfort to the people and it is good that Governor Ahmed Usman Ododo is being extolled for such qualities by the grateful Kogi people, both within and in the diaspora.
His humility must have clearly begun with his family. The proof of this claim that Ododo’s charity actually began from home before it now thrives is in his robust relationship with his former boss and predecessor, Ex Governor Yahaya Adoza Bello, his cabinet members.
Whenever people juxtapose the relationship between Governor Ododo and Ex Governor Bello with that of Governor Fubara of Rivers State and his former boss and Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Minister, Nyesom Wike, people argue, rightly or wrongly, that Fubara could have avoided the crisis that gave Rivers State a sorrowful State of Emergency Rule and other retrogressive crises that have continued unabated if he has had the skill that is helping Ododo to stay in the same boat with his godfather without rocking the boat.
If he had lacked the skill, people reason that the situation would have been like that of the proverbial two elephants, ferociously fighting each other, falling themselves thunderously to the ground and rolling over each other on the grieving grass. We are the grass.
People have attributed this resistance to such temptation to Ododo’s humility they said would never fail to carry baskets of gratitude to the house of its benefactor. Others would have turned even a perceived intrusion into a bole ka aja situation, let us turn it into a violent fight. Observers added.
Such is the rare quality of Ododo. He knows his mortar pestle carries enough power to kill a man on whose head it may monstrously hit. He therefore said to himself,
“Why do I have to tie charms around the pestle for more power. The good people of Kogi State have made me their Governor with the enormous power it steeled its waist and arms with, and for throwing any challenger? No! Let me respect them. My mandate is theirs, which they freely gave to me.”
Governor Ododo does not give and bully his beneficiaries as many benefactors do. He is developing the State and you will never hear a word of pomposity from him. His friends, allies and Cabinet members he does not bully as if they had signed to be in Master-slave agreement. Yet Ododo’s warm-heartedness they know they must never misconstrue to mean weakness.
For two times in recent time, his ally and friend, Senator Smart Adeyemi rightly described Ododo as humility personified. Also adoring him in a function at Government House, the Secretary to Government to the State, Dr Folashade Ayoade simply called him the humility-Personified Governor.
Senator Tunde Ogbeha said this to The Graphic Newspaper of Governor Ododo, ” Ododo is not the type of Governor I can openly criticize. He came to seek for my support when he was contesting for governorship position. I told him I would not support him because we belonged to different Political Parties, mine PDP and APC as his Party.
I said as an old man, I could only pray for him which I did. After he won and became the Kogi State Governor, he came back to this my house again and thanked me. The other time, I wanted to travel from Abuja to see him in Lokoja over an issue raised by my Lokoja people. Out of the respect he believed I deserve said I should not come. He came to meet me to know what the matter was. Governor Ododo’s humility is his strength.
Not only those in Government or those that are close to it know him as someone who abhors hubris or arrogance. Governor Ododo has always seen himself as one of the citizens. For him, the line between him and the people is as tiny as a slender thread.
Governor Ododo once attended a rally in Ajaokuta LGA which was being interrupted by showers of rain. ” Ah! the Governor is being beaten by rain, an embarrassed aide hollered.’ Before a wink, an umbrella, wide like a two-room thatched hut, was brought and eagerly spread over Governor Ododo’s head.
“Take it away?,” he protested, What of the mammoth crowd the rain is beating now, can you cover their heads with umbrellas. How many umbrellas will do us?” Since the rain is beating us, let it beat all of us.” And the insensitive umbrella folded itself and left in shame. Such is the humility and simplicity of Governor Ahmed Ododo.
To say people’s happiness is what is upper most in the mind of Governor Ododo is to state the obvious. Anywhere the Governor goes, he will not forget to charge his lieutenants to do some projects that will gladden the hearts of their respective communities.
“Each of you should sink three boreholes for your communities. You, Special Assistants, if only you could on monthly basis spare just #20, 000, out of your salary as your contributions to your wards, before long, there could be somehow a meaningful reduction in our people’s pervading poverty. We must give back to the society.
Having said that, he turned to the people. Please, our people, those in this Government are your children. Stop insulting them on the social media platforms. If you think they err, call them home and peacefully resolve issues with them.
As for me, people can insult me. that is their business. As Kogi citizens, you did not give me your mandate to go and engage my detractors in mutual insults. My concern is how not to fail in the delivery of the dividends of democracy to you. At times, when we do projects, people would say they want to come and thank me. No, the reverse should be the case. You gave us your mandate out of millions of Kogi people.
Those of us in government should be the ones to be thanking you for making us the lucky ones. We should rather give gratitude to you.
As a Governor, my Community still summons me to their meeting if they feel offended by me. The other time I attended such a meeting. I listened to them and I apologized to them for the offense they said I committed. And we resolved amicably for our Community to move forward.
That is Governor Ododo for you. He is ever humble. It is not that he does not know his strength as a Governor. But he knows that humility is the kernel of good governance, its ABC. It is the foundation upon which democratic governance is built. For that strength, people will adore you, you will not lose focus, and quietly you will achieve much for the people.
I recently had conversation with a Labour leader in the State. He had many praise words, phrases and sentences, simple and complex for our Governor. “Within two years Ododo has done many good things.
We Civil Servants and Pensioners know the value of our salaries. Who came to restore full salary payment to us? Who is doing a lot in the battle against insecurity, Socio-economic problem of our people across the three Senatorial Districts without making unnecessary noise like an empty barrel about it? Ododo” He answered his questions himself.
“But it remains something,” what is that something, tell me, I asked him. Ododo has done many things, let him return Visiting Days by the good people of Kogi State to Government House and other important Government Offices of those days. It is not his fault, that governance culture died long ago. Governor, his deputy, Commissioners, Local Government Chairmen and other government top functionaries, all used to have their different Visiting Days to which people travelled from far and near to meet them one-on-one with different categories of issues.
This is one other way by which Government can be made directly closest to the people at the Grassroots. Call it ABC of good governance if you like
Do you know that in many of our traditional societies, Chief Priests as intermediaries between the people and their gods were responsible for the widening gulf that now exist between their gods and them. There is trust deficit.
A story was told of a woman who once went to seek for solution to her barrenness from her community fertility god through the Chief Priest.
Chief Priest:
Ori konko said I should greet you. He said you should bring two hundred tubers of yam, twenty two big pots of palm oil, seven healthy he-goats and seven pregnant she goats, twelve sheep, a bowl of Kolanuts, bags of salt and sugar to my house after which you and I will sleep on the same mat for seven days before Orikonko wili permit me to tell you what you will do to get pregnant.
Barren woman:
Chief Priest, could you please allow me to see this god himself and hear from him directly. I hear that he is a kind, moral, disciplined and incorruptible god, he will take pity on me and give me a child I too can call my own.
Chief Priest:
Ha ha ha! See this woman. You think you are wise. You? see Orikonko face to face, who do you think you are? Go, you are not ready to get pregnant.You don’t like child-bearing. Leave the shrine before I open my red eye.
As the Labour man finished the story of the god, his Chief priest and the barren woman, I said to him:
In just two years, the Governor has impressed so many with good achievements. It is just that no matter the expertise of the thatcher, smoke must still find its way through the thatch roof. Governor Ododo will know how to handle the smoke holes in the thatched house.
– YJ Itopa, Journalist and Poet writes from Lokoja.
