By Bilesanmi Abayomi
The New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) candidate for Kosofe Federal Constituency of Lagos, Abdulwaheed Omotayo Odunuga, has promised to sponsor a bill to curb foreign schooling and medical tourism among public office holders when elected.
Odunuga made this known during the second part of the media parley held with the Kosofe Post at his Agboyi Ketu residence over the weekend.
The candidate explained that the move was intended to further strengthen the education and health sectors.
Odunuga said when elected he would do a lot of things differently by advocating for bills and motions that would impact the lives of people, among others.
He said, “I will be doing a lot, as I said earlier. The first thing we will bring is hope and trust back to governance for our people, so they believe they have done the right thing by electing us.
“Secondly, we will be sponsoring bills and motions that will impact people’s lives. I know this is going to be a tough one, but we need to be honest with ourselves, and getting a bill passed in the house is not child’s play.
“This is because we have 360 members; I will have 359 colleagues in the house, and you need a simple majority to get a bill passed. The candidate disagreed with being a minority when elected, and he appealed to Nigerians to ensure that credible candidates emerged across the country to actualize the mass-oriented proposed bill.”
Odunuga noted that with 359 colleagues in the house, they would need the majority of their support to get a bill passed.
He therefore appealed to Nigerians and people in Kosofe to also pass the message to the people to ensure credible candidates emerged because, if not, they would have limitations to whatever they could do.
Odunuga said he would also sponsor bills that would strengthen public institutions and mandate officeholders to use a public facility.
He said, “One thing I will be doing differently, I have made up my mind that I will be sponsoring bills on public institutions by appointed or elected office holders such as health and schools.
“What I am trying to say is that the children of politicians must attend public schools and hospitals. With that, I believe our public institutions will be in a better place because you don’t have any choice but to make use of those public institutions.
“The bill has been sponsored before on the floor of the house, but it failed. I think the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, killed the bill that should have been passed two years ago. It was sponsored by a PDP lawmaker. We are very optimistic that by the time they see the PDP guy in the house and other credible candidates from other locations, the bill will be passed into law.”
Odunuga said one thing he noticed was lacking in their present democracy, especially on the floor of the house: the problem was not even the laws, it was ensuring that the laws were obeyed and oversight functions.
He also observed that, in regard to constituency projects, he doesn’t think anybody has fought for constituency projects more than he has done in Lagos and Kosofe.
According to him, “I have noticed a lot of our constituency projects are fraudulent, a lot of them not just in Kosofe but in the entire state and the entire southwest. And I tell people when they see constituency projects, mostly empowerment projects, that I have an issue with them because these are programs that will even be difficult for you to account for. It’s always very difficult for the anti-corruption agencies to even investigate because how do you investigate the distribution of 20 hairdressing machines to beneficiaries when those beneficiaries are not even hairdressers?
“One of the things we will change in whatever project we are nominating for the floor of the house is the need for programs and projects that are sustainable. They will be projects that impact people’s lives. For instance, during my campaign, I went to Shangisha, where I saw a lot of boreholes—more than six—that people are not using, because almost everybody in that axis has boreholes in their houses. Do you need a borehole in those locations when you have Agboyi Ketu that’s suffering from water? So, our projects will be based on the needs of the people, not what we want to do for the people. It’s what they need.
“Most of these projects we will not just do; we will do them in conjunction with community leaders, the Community Development Committee, and Community Development Associations because we have seen a lot of projects that are bad after 4 or 8 years with the current holder and no one will fix them. So any project we will be doing, we will do it in conjunction with the community. We will do a project that they’re ready to take ownership of after maybe a year or two years because we cannot be there forever.
“After leaving, who will manage those constituency projects? Those are things we will be doing differently, so that on its own, it can be sustainable.
Another thing I will be bringing on board are oversight functions. Our national assembly is lacking in that we are always putting pressure on the presidency and placing all the blame on it. For instance, the fuel scarcity is something we have done in the past under the Buhari Youth Organization; during the fuel scarcity, we dispatched our members in Kosofe to fuel stations and gave daily reports to the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR). A lot of fuel stations were sealed in Kosofe.
“Now, what is our House of Representatives member doing? We have price regulations, and I believe no filling station should be selling above the pump price. Now even NNPC has changed their price to N185; others sold as much as N280 in Alapere yesterday, and nobody is saying anything. Do we expect Buhari to come and fight for that? The job of Reps., our representatives, is to say, “This is what is happening in my constituency at the National Assembly.
“I will have 359 colleagues that will be in the house, and you need a majority of their support to get a bill passed. That is why we are appealing to Nigerians and people in Kosofe to also pass the message on to our people in other locations to ensure that credible candidates emerge, because if not, we will have limitations to whatever we can do. One thing I will do differently is that I have made up my mind that I will be sponsoring bills on public institutions by appointed or elected office holders such as Health and schools.
What I am trying to say is that “the children of political office holders must attend public schools and public hospitals.” With that, I believe our public institutions will be in a better place because you don’t have any choice but to make use of those public institutions. That bill has been sponsored before on the floor of the house, and it failed. I think the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rtd. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamilla, killed the bill that should have been passed two years ago; it was sponsored by a PDP lawmaker. We are very optimistic that by the time they see the PDP guy in the house and other credible candidates from other locations, the bill will be passed into law.”
He further noted that the laws’ enactment is not the problem bedevilling the country’s democracy, saying “it’s ensuring that the laws are being obeyed and oversight functions.”
He added, “I have observed, as you know, that when it comes to constituency projects, I don’t think anybody has fought for constituency projects more than I do in Lagos and Kosofe. And one thing I have noticed is that a lot of our constituency projects are fraudulent, a lot of them not just in Kosofe but in the entire state and the entire southwest. And I tell people when they see constituency projects, mostly empowerment projects, that I have an issue with it because these are programs, and it will even be difficult for you to account for them.
“It’s always very difficult for the anti-corruption agencies to even investigate because how do you investigate the distribution of 20 hairdressing machines to beneficiaries when those beneficiaries are not even hairdressers?”
Odunuga said during his campaign he went to Shangisha and dug more than six boreholes that people were not using because almost everybody in that axis had boreholes in their houses.
According to him, “Do they need boreholes in those locations when you have Agboyi Ketu, which lacks boreholes? So our projects will be based on the needs of the people, not what we want to do for the people. It’s what they need.”
He said most of these projects would be implemented in conjunction with community leaders, the community development committee, and community development associations.
The candidate said this was because he had seen several projects that were bad after four or eight years with the current holder and nobody would fix them.
He said with regard to oversight functions, the national assembly was lacking in that aspect, but they always put pressure on the presidency, putting every blame on the presidency.
“For instance, the fuel scarcity is something we have done in the past under the Buhari Youth Organization; during the fuel scarcity, we dispatched our members in Kosofe to fuel stations. They give reports daily to the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) about the fuel stations we sealed in Kosofe. Now, what is our House of Representatives member doing?
“Because we have price regulations, and I believe no filling station should be selling above the pump price. Now even NNPC has changed their price to N185; others sold as much as N280 in Alapere yesterday, and nobody is saying anything. Do we expect Buhari to come and fight for that?
“The job of Reps., our representatives, is to say this is what is happening in my community at the national assembly. You have access to agencies of government. If I were in their shoes, all I would need to do is collect these filling stations and make an official report to DPR. I can assure you that it will be attended to within 48 hours.
“But look at the suffering our people are facing because we don’t have good representatives, because they are not actually thinking, or because they just thought governance was all about making laws on the floor of the house of assembly.
“You have lots of things to do within your community to change a lot of things, not just on the floor of the House of Assembly,” he said.
Odunuga said the best feedback they could receive was from their grassroots, and the best people to actually provide that feedback to relevant agencies were the elected representatives from those communities.
While speaking on alliances with other opposition parties, he noted that if the current ruling party had not formed a merger, it would have been very difficult to wrestle power from the former ruling party.
The candidate urged smaller opposition parties to ally to wrestle the party from the ruling party, saying that they could get a credible candidate who was more popular than him who could win the election and that he doesn’t mind stepping down.
He, however, vowed not to step down for the ruling party candidate; it will never happen.
Odunuga said Nigerians should understand one basic fact: they complained of the youths because they distanced themselves from the electioneering process and the election because they didn’t see a credible candidate.
The candidate said if all political parties presented the same kind of candidates, the best one could do was just go home and sleep.
He said, “For instance, in 2015, a lot of people came out with the hope that Buhari will change things in the country; even people who had never voted in their lives came out to vote for Buhari. Now they believe the same thing. If a credible candidate emerges from most of the political parties, you will see our youths coming out to campaign for them and vote for them. That’s what we have in Kosofe today, especially since the youths see that credibility in us, and that’s the reason why we are not seeing anything difficult when it comes to the issue of funding.
“I always tell people one thing: when you are not more popular, you have to spend much more on the election. When you are popular, you spend less.”
In his appeal message to the people of Kosofe and Nigeria at large, he urged them to still have hope in the country and charged them to get their PVC cards, take their protest and anger to the polling booths on February 25 and March 11, and vote out bad governance, among others.
He said his message to the people of Kosofe was for them to have hope in this country, not just Kosofe.
Odunuga said It was high time for them because he knew they were angry, and with that anger, the best thing they could do was take it to the ballot box to protest against the bad governance so far and also vote for the best candidate.
He noted that the problems of the country go beyond political parties, imploring citizens to vote for candidates, not political parties.
According to him, “Voters should vote for candidates irrespective of political affiliation; they should not be deceived by tribes or religion; they should ensure that the best candidate emerges irrespective of political affiliation, ethnicity, or religious sentiment.”
Similarly, he appealed to the big boys not to allow themselves to be used by politicians and charged security agencies with doing their jobs professionally.