The Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Adegboyega Oyetola, has been extolled for his “huge act of kindness” by restoring the name, dignity and pride of the Ilesa Grammar School after what was described as an aberrant and clumsy educational policy of the government of Ogbeni Rauf Aregebola.
This laudation was expressed by the National President of the Ilesa Grammar School Old Students Association, Engr Obisesan Daramola, on the occasion of the 90th Founder’s Day Anniversary Celebrations of the prestigious school.
Daramola, in a speech sub-titled “The Dark Clouds 2017-2020,” said a cloud came upon Ilesa Grammar School in 2017 when the then Osun State Government, headed coincidentally by an Ijesa son, Ogbeni Rauf Aregebola, initiated a schools re-classification policy which in the process impacted their Alma Mater.
For three years, according to Daramola, the school compound was overtaken by bushes and trees and was a good habitat for rodents, antelopes, sheep and goats.
However in October 2020, “God used the former Governor of Osun State, His Excellency Isiaka Adegboyega Oyetola, to give us back our school,” Daramola submitted.
He added that Oyetola “restored with our name our dignity, our identity, our pride, and our honour.”
He concluded that the current and old students of the school, famous for being the first secondary school in Ijesaland and second in the whole of Osun State, “are grateful to Almighty God and former Governor Oyetola” for his profound gesture and exceptional magnanimity.