The Agbowo Shopping Complex project has failed spectacularly, becoming one of the most controversial broken promises of the Makinde administration. During his first term in September 2020, Governor Makinde leased the 36-year-old complex to Whitestone Global Limited for 50 years with a promised capital injection of N4.9 billion to convert it into premium commercial real estate and a four-star hotel. 

 

The governor boasted that the renovation would be completed before May 2023.​ However, by February 2026, more than four years after the flag-off, the project remains abandoned and incomplete. 

 

 

In August 2025, the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Oyo State demanded compensation for thousands of legal occupants who were forcefully ejected from the facility in 2019. The opposition party stated: 

 

"Unfortunately, the same sprawling complex is now a shadow of itself as nothing was done on it since 2019". 

 

The government's own tracking document attempts to present a more positive picture, stating that "Reconstruction/Remodelling of Agbowo shopping complex is ongoing", but this directly contradicts multiple credible reports of the project's abandonment.​ 

 

 

Suppliers, sub-contractors, and shop owners have protested the project's failure, claiming they are owed over N250 million for materials and services rendered since two years prior. Many borrowed money through bank loans to participate in the project, and their properties have been seized for non-payment. 

 

The complex, which in its glory days generated over 5,000 direct jobs and was the biggest shopping mall in Oyo State with a central air conditioner and cinema house, has now become a symbol of unfulfilled promises.​