{"id":193242,"date":"2026-02-01T20:24:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T19:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/uncategorized\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years"},"modified":"2026-02-01T21:28:41","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T20:28:41","slug":"sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years","title":{"rendered":"Sowore Critiques Ondo&#8217;s Public Holiday for 50 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. <\/strong><\/span>Human rights activist and former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 elections, Omoyele Sowore, has expressed concern over what he described as the absence of development in Ondo State.<\/p>\n<p>According to Sowore, an indigene of the state, who hails from Kiribo, Ese-Odo Local Government Area, stressed that the state ought to be mourning poor governance and not the declaration of public holidays.<\/p>\n<p>Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa had declared Monday and Tuesday public holidays for residents of the state in order to be part of the 50th anniversary celebrations of the state.<\/p>\n<p>Sowore, who is the convener of the #RevolutionNow and Take-It-Back movements, stated the state has been stagnant under the watch of Aiyedatiwa with the absence of a developmental or renewal plan.<\/p>\n<p>He said, \u201cIt would be more fitting for Ondo State citizens to aid Governor Hon. Lucky Orimisan Aiyedatiwa in proclaiming a day of mourning over poor governance rather than observing a public holiday for the state\u2019s 50th anniversary.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOndo @50 has been reduced to little more than spectacle and fluff under Hon. Lucky Orimisan Aiyedatiwa\u2019s watch. There are no refurbished schools to showcase. No bridges built.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo completed roads to commission. No hospitals to open, and no concrete security achievements to speak of.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cInstead of milestones, citizens are offered pageantry; instead of progress, some physical dance performance.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>At 50, Ondo State is not marking development or renewal but merely dancing around its own stagnation while thuggery thrives and governance remains conspicuously absent.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, an aide to the governor, Yomi Oyekan, stated that Sowore does not understand the governance, hence the constant attack on constituted authorities.<\/p>\n<p>Oyekan, who is a Senior Special Assistant to Aiyedatiwa, said, \u201cRunning a state is not running a Twitter space. Institutions are not built with rage, and development is not measured by how angry a post sounds. What\u2019s more disappointing is that this comes from an Ondo son, someone who should understand the depth of our challenges. Instead of offering insight, timelines, or comparative analysis, you default to exaggeration: \u201cnothing exists, nothing works, everything is fluff.\u201d That\u2019s not bravery; that\u2019s intellectual laziness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou claim high morality while you\u2019ve never allowed democracy in the political party you founded. At some point, perpetual outrage stops looking like activism and starts looking like irrelevance. When a man spends years announcing collapse everywhere, people eventually stop asking him for direction.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Nigeria<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. Human rights activist and former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 elections, Omoyele Sowore, has expressed concern over what he described as the absence of development in Ondo State. According to Sowore, an indigene of the state, who hails from Kiribo, Ese-Odo Local Government Area, stressed that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":193240,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,14],"tags":[254],"class_list":["post-193242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-nigeria"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Sowore Critiques Ondo&#039;s Public Holiday for 50 Years - Nigeria<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Human rights activist and former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 elections, Omoy ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sowore Critiques Ondo&#039;s Public Holiday for 50 Years\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Human rights activist and former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 elections, Omoy ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nigeria\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-02-01T19:24:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-02-01T20:28:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2026\/02\/sm_1769977636.444816.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"793\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"515\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Sowore Critiques Ondo&#8217;s Public Holiday for 50 Years\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-02-01T19:24:09+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-02-01T20:28:41+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\"},\"wordCount\":419,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2026\/02\/sm_1769977636.444816.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Nigeria\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"Policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/sowore-critiques-ondos-public-holiday-for-50-years\",\"name\":\"Sowore Critiques Ondo's Public Holiday for 50 Years - 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