The Governor of Osun, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola has urged students to imbibe the spirit of self-help in all they do, just as he urged members of the society to engage in voluntary services to make their environment and community better.
He made the call while playing host to members of the Volunteer Corps, Nigeria, Osogbo Government High School Branch, led by their Chairman, Sir Ademola Aladekomo, at Government House, Osogbo.
Governor Aregbesola attributed the inability of the three tiers of government to meet some critical needs of the society to lack of support from the people.
He said that certain things don’t work well in Nigeria’s system due to the lack of volunteerism to human and capital development as well as people’s negligence to civic responsibilities.
The governor held that for Nigeria and Nigerians to meet their aspirations in all aspects of life, the citizens must begin to see selfless service and spirit of volunteerism as fundamental principles of existence.
He pointed out that the present economic reality has made it difficult for government to meet all its responsibilities to the people, hence, the need to be supported by all.
According to him, “our system is under-performing largely due to negligence of people who are directly or indirectly involved in the system.
“A society can only develop satisfactorily if her people are ready to come together to work for her growth and development.
“The needs of government remains insatiable, thus, informing the need for the people to champion any course capable of supporting government in meeting her statutory obligations to the people and the society at large”, he stressed.
Commending the Corps for being supportive to government’s efforts on education, Aregbesola directed all to emulate the kind gesture exhibited by the leadership of the Corps.
He said his administration remains receptive to the course of volunteerism not only in schools but in all sectors of the economy as the spirit remains the catalyst to all round growth and development.
“This Corps has shown to the world that through volunteerism, our society could be rescued from challenges which government may find difficult to solve due non availability of resources.
“ We recommend this for society, schools, students, teachers and organizations as we have seen good works that have been done through this scheme”, he added.
Governor Aregbesola therefore urged the students to imbibe the culture and ethos of Omoluabi, saying, “success is dependent on confidence, faith and work”.
Earlier in his remarks, the Chairman of Volunteer Corps of Nigeria, Sir Ademola Aladekomo, said the scheme had impacted meaningfully on the lives of the students who hitherto did not believe in great things one can achieve through volunteerism.
Aladekomo who himself is an old student of Osogbo Government High School, disclosed that the Corps had renovated, refurbished and repainted different block of classrooms in the school.
He therefore implored all to gear up towards supporting the Government’s efforts by contributing individual quota to advance the required growth and development.
