The member representing Yewa North/Imeko-Afon federal constituency in the House of Representatives and a former governorship candidate in Ogun state, Gboyega Nasir Isiaka, spoke about his constituency, economic reforms of the federal government, Ogun State politics and others. Excerpts:
Having contested the governorship election thrice, why did you decide to come down to the level of House of Representatives?
It is not about coming down, it is about same service and the circumstances of that time, Governor Dapo Abiodun was going for a second term, we are in the same party, he is my leader, we threw everything behind him to have a second term and after all said and done, the party leadership concluded that I should serve at the level of House of Representatives, it is still in line with the service which I had wanted to do at another level previously but which was not available for consideration at that time, I don’t have any regret about it.
You have a 15-point development agenda for Yewa North/Imeko-Afon federal constituency, what is this all about and how do you intend to achieve this?
We got together to come up with a plan that looks into the details of the circumstances of our federal constituency, what I considered as our strength, opportunities and our weaknesses so that one can be guided and at the end of it all we came up with a very detailed information about everything that we need to know.
So we engaged professionals from across the board, geologists, surveyors, geographers that gave us detailed information about the area. We also knew more about the importance of us being a border community, in Ogun State; this is the only federal constituency that is bordered from beginning to end by the international community, that is, the Benin Republic.
We also listed industrial development, infrastructural development, road network and we tried to divide them into which sections of administration of governance are supposed to look at them, there are those that can only be done by the executive, there are those that can come through constituency projects by the various levels of governance, that is the Senate, House of Representatives or state assembly, there are those that we can pursue from NGOs and individuals. We learned that water is one of our major problems. So all of these we have put together and have been guiding my discussions on the floor of the house.
One of the areas I have paid attention to is the development of border communities in the country as a whole, because I know that the major comparative advantage of my federal constituency is that we have a whole stretch of border town, so how do we push for federal government to pay attention to the border communities, once that is done it will benefit me. Now they said they want to have an open economy in the continent, those of us at the border have some advantages on those things. That is why we are pushing an agro and export based industrial park or an agro and export-based free trade zone.
We also discovered that in one of the local governments in my constituency, there is no Computer Based Center, so for students to write JAMB or any examination that is CBT-based they have to go to two or three local governments away, so in my constituency project I have to put that as priority. So we have worked with the private sector and the state government because in our area we have good land for rice, cotton and tomato plantations, we are pursuing the private sector to see how we can do that. We have been able to do cotton and rice planting, we are also looking at how we do others.
How far have you been able to achieve these things that are on paper?
No, they are not on paper, all the ones I have said are examples of what I have done, I mentioned cotton and rice, we have signed agreements with investors that are working on that, I mentioned industrial park and free trade zone, we have done a bill that has gone to open reading calling for establishment of a free trade zone in that area, I mentioned CBT, the CBT centre in that area is almost completed now, I mentioned water, we have about five or six locations where water is being put and so on I just mentioned them as examples.
But an economic plan is not to be executed all by me either now or later. I don’t intend to be in the House of Representatives for the next 15 years, neither do I have the capacity to do everything but it will just help us to know the path that we can take in our area to have greatness.
As a chieftain of the APC are you not worried that some of the reforms of the president have led to hardship on the masses?
If I have any worry at all, it is that people should understand that we cannot have omelet without breaking the egg. We need those reforms, we are a country of over 200 million people, it is not the way we are operating now that we should be operating, we definitely need to do a lot more.
There are so much reforms that we need, we need it in the energy sector, we need it in the fiscal and monetary regimes, and it only takes boldness for those things to be done, but I am confident we are already negotiating the bends and we should begin to see the positive impacts of some of these things, the truth of the matter is that we can only be postponing the doomsday if we keep sitting on these things and continue to operate the way we were operating and that is why I appreciate the courage and the boldness that Mr. President to take those steps because they are not steps that can be taken by somebody that is lily-livered, we only need to fix a few things within our institutions so that these policies can give us the results that we need. In so many other climes, they do these things and they get results, and it is not as if these results came overnight.
It takes a bit of time to come but they are also supported by strong institutions, strong judiciary, strong law enforcement agencies, it is just for us to have these in place so that we can see the results happening, but in terms of whether we need the reforms or not, I am convinced beyond doubt that we definitely need some of these bold and courage steps.
Talking about the controversial tax reform bills, do you think President Tinubu’s approach was good enough?
We are almost out of it. To me everything has been zeroed down to the issue of VAT, unless any other thing comes up. However, we cannot overdo orientation, we have over 200 million people speaking various dialects, so even if you say you want to do orientation in Ogun State, yes, you can do it in Yoruba, the average person will get it, we have the Eguns, we have the Ketus and that is how we have it all over the place.
So in that sense, there can never be an end to orientation, but from the totality of what we had from the committee that handled it, they tried their best to explain it to the people, a lot of things came into it, the typical politics happened, there are some people that didn’t understand it, there are also some genuine fears that also came up, particularly in the area of VAT. But I am happy that Mr. President in his media chat said there will be discussions and in the National Assembly, the Senate has passed it for second reading going into public hearing any moment from now, although yet to be passed in the House of Representatives.
I believe that it is going to be passed anytime the leadership brings it back and then it goes into public hearing, so whatever is left in order for it to meet the expectations of everybody we can then talk about it. Take out politics from these bills, there is nothing that is wrong with it that cannot be corrected by the system that we have in the country.
“If I have any worry at all, it is that people should understand that we cannot have omelet without breaking the egg. We need those reforms, we are a country of over 200 million people, it is not the way we are operating now that we should be operating, we definitely need to do a lot more”
As the chairman of the house committee on students’ loan, scholarship and higher education, what are your impressions about the implementation of the students’ loan scheme?
It is okay, of course there can always be improvement particularly for a programme that has just kicked off, by April, the law will be one year, the launching was done in July, so it is barely six months ago, there will still be some teething issues, all of those ones we have to overcome for us to have a perfect programme, particularly in the area of the time it takes for students that applied and the approval given to the time they get their stipends.
I think there are still some issues between the schools and NELFUND but they are trying to streamline that so that we can move forward. If there is any project that Mr. President is giving 100 percent support, this is one of the many, you hardly see him making any speech without talking about NELFUND, in terms of political support, this project has it, in terms of structure, it is very good, the law that we were using now has to be rearranged from the one that was inherited from the 9th assembly so that we can strengthen it and it has been reasonably strengthened, we now have a board headed by a banker, Jim Ovia, we have a management that is headed by someone that knows about it, the board of the company that also have people from different backgrounds is also there and we are doing our oversight function, things can definitely get better, particularly in the area of speed.
Talking about Ogun State politics, how best do you think the agitation for Ogun West person to be governor can be achieved?
I am not going to talk about that, whatever I say now too many meanings will go into it, the only thing I am going to say is that it is only fair and just for Ogun West to be governor, we better just leave it like that, how to go about it and all that we will talk about it at the appropriate time sometime in future.
Are you still interested in the governorship of Ogun State? Cuts in…
…if I don’t want to talk about Ogun West governorship, how will I answer this? When we get to the bridge, we will cross it.
As someone that contested against Dapo Abiodun before, what is your candid assessment of the last five and half years in the state?
The governor has done very well, he is a quiet achiever, he doesn’t talk much but when you come to Ogun State you will see the difference, in the area of industrial development, the state has continued to attract investors, there are those that come because of where we are located and there are some that come because of the infrastructure that are either being seen now or potentially going to be there, for instance the airport.
The airport from what we are reading is going to start commercial operation by the middle of this year. The road network is improving, also in the area of housing, a lot is being done. Within the area of the airport, some major initiatives are coming there, for instance, the customs is moving all its development there that is also facilitated by the governor. My federal constituency has enjoyed lots of road development done by the governor, in every sector he has come out in using the acronym of his government “Ise ya” and he is doing a lot for the state.
