48 Hours in Office: How Festus Alenkhe Brought Governor Okpebholo to EBS—and Secured Instant Reform
It took precisely 48 hours for the newly appointed acting Managing Director of the Edo Broadcasting Service (EBS), Festus Alenkhe, to prove that his leadership would not be business as usual. In a swift, calculated, and high-impact move on Monday, Alenkhe successfully attracted the Executive Governor of Edo State, Senator Monday Okpebholo, to the station’s corporate headquarters in Aduwawa, Benin City.
The Governor’s firsthand assessment of the state-owned broadcaster did not just expose years of systemic decay; it triggered immediate, sweeping intervention from the state government, signaling a turning point for the long-suffering media house.
For years, EBS has battled deteriorating infrastructure, but it took Alenkhe’s proactive invitation to lay the reality bare before the state’s highest authority. Accompanied by the Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Blessing Agbebaku, and the Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Prince Kassim Afegbua, Governor Okpebholo was taken on an extensive guided tour of the facilities by the new acting MD.
What the Governor saw left him visibly distressed and resentful. He openly described the state of the broadcast house as an “eyesore” and “embarrassing.”
“Coming here this morning and being told that the transmitter is not working, I am in pain,” Governor Okpebholo told journalists immediately after the inspection. “Whatever it is, we can make it work. The only people that can fix Edo State are the people of Edo themselves. It’s only Edo that can build Edo.”
The Governor revealed that his visit was also prompted by the sudden resignation of the former Managing Director, who had recently been redeployed to pioneer the Edo State Orientation Agency. The transition, coupled with Alenkhe’s urgent mobilization, forced a critical spotlight on the station’s deep-seated operational challenges.
Alenkhe’s strategic move to bring the Governor to the scene yielded instant dividends. Addressing the critical lack of mobility that has long crippled the station’s roving reporters, Alenkhe made a direct appeal for operational vehicles.
“You ask for a bus, but by the grace of God, before the end of today, we will send you two buses to enable you to do your job effectively by moving around the city and reporting adequately.”
Furthermore, the Governor expressed shock that a transmitter previously funded by his administration had been left uninstalled by the past management. To permanently solve the station’s crippling power issues, Okpebholo announced plans to construct a green-energy solution.
“We will solve the issue of power by providing a Solar mini-grid for the station to ensure you are on air all the time when you don’t have diesel or electricity to operate. This is the right way to go because this is what is applicable all around the world,” the Governor asserted.
With the Governor promising a complete architectural and technical facelift—revealing that designs are ready and procurement processes are already underway—the new acting MD, Festus Alenkhe, expressed profound gratitude.
Alenkhe, a veteran broadcaster whose appointment has been widely praised, commended the Governor for his consistency in paying civil servants’ salaries and assured him that EBS would aggressively and positively project the activities of the state government.
With the assurance of new infrastructure and steady solar power, Alenkhe set a bold new target for the station: “We want to assure you that when the facilities needed are provided for the station, EBS will operate for 24 hours,” Alenkhe declared, noting that the station currently shuts down at midnight. “Our intention is that from this moment… the station will operate an additional 12 hours to make it 24 hours.”
By bringing the Governor face-to-face with the harsh realities of EBS within just two days of taking the helm, Festus Alenkhe has not only demonstrated administrative grit but has also secured the vital political will needed to rescue the station.
With two new buses arriving immediately, a solar mini-grid on the horizon, and a complete engineering overhaul in the pipeline, the Alenkhe era at EBS has begun with a masterstroke of crisis management and decisive leadership.
