Ibadan — Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State says his urban renewal programme was targeted at changing the tag of the capital city as one of the filthiest in Nigeria, making the state attractive to visitors and investors, as well as halting periodic accidents that claim the lives of street traders and hawkers.

Addressing Molete Bridge traders in Ibadan yesterday whose shops were demolished at the weekend, the governor said the urban renewal programme would not come without some measure of pain, urging the people to take it as their sacrifice towards beautifying the state and making it better than it used to be.

According to him, the state had gained the notoriety of dirt over the years, which was a tag that any lover of development would resist, saying that Oyo people were lovers of aesthetics and good living.

The governor said the state government was building six to eight modern markets of simple technology with all the conveniences, whose locations are not far from the former squatting locations of the traders.