In an interview with a graduate of political science from the University of Lagos, 2021 ADP-Action Democratic Party Councillorship candidate for Ogudu and 2023 PDP House of Assembly Aspirant for Kosofe Constituency 1, Babashola Owoaje shared his brief plans with Kosofe Post recently.
Tell us more about yourself?
I am currently General Manager of Penaid Limited, a finance company located in Lagos. We give loans to pensioners and it is the first in the country. We have four branches and over 10 agents across the federation. I am one of the pioneers of the company and I have been managing it for over six years.
What inspired you to enter the House of Assembly race?
Naturally, as a political scientist, I should be drawn to anything political and that is why even last year I contested for a councillorship with the small political party in the Ogudu/Ojota area and I emerged second because I was able to win seven polling units despite having just three registered party members in the whole of Kosofe.
So you can imagine how I was able to man various polling units without having party members among my people.
However, I am presently in the biggest structure, which is the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and I have been accepted 100 percent into the PDP family.
I am one of those who is fed up with the current administration, particularly at the House of Assembly level, which is why I decided to run for the position.
What do you have for your people if given your party’s mandate and when elected?
If given the party mandate, we need to understand the role of a lawmaker. Their role is to enact laws that are favorable to most of their constituents.
A lawmaker is expected to conduct a lot of town hall meetings to find out where the shoes pinch people.
Looking at the Kosofe Constituency 1, we have Ogudu and Ojota, Oworo-Ifako, Gbagada Anthony, and Mende. We have done quite a number of needs assessments across the board.
One of the things we realized is that there is a need for re-orientation of the youth, which is one of my strongest agendas.
We also have places where the government can impact on them in terms of physical planning. Education is also very important, and we have several people that need to be encouraged to return to school.
We have not left out the market women and even the enlightened people because we have a lot of estates in this constituency.
What has been the synergy between the estate and the rural communities within this constituency? How can we make everybody grow together? This is my principal agenda.
Apart from that, it is a representative position because it is also a leadership position because I should be seen as someone that can inspire the people of Kosofe Constituency 1.
In my six years of managing micro finance, where I dealt with mostly elderly senior citizens, I have realised that these people have been neglected for too long, so I will also be paying attention to pensioners and senior citizens in the constituency.
Those are the major goals that I intend to achieve once I am given the mandate to flag the party at the next election.
What are the bills you intend to initiate?
When we are talking about bills, we should be talking about the ones that encourage education at all levels, but we will be paying attention to the primary level because the foundation is very important to whatever anybody wants to achieve in life.
We will be talking about bills that protect senior citizens in the state, bills that protect the informal sector and encourage them to do business in the right way.
We will also look at bills that support enterprise development. We can set up technical schools in the constituency.
Those are the bills I look forward to championing in the House if elected, and I will also support bills by other members that will bring meaningful developments to the people.