The member representing Ibadan North-West/South-West Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives, Hon. Dhikirulahi Stanley Adedeji Olajide, popularly known as Odidiomo, is also the chairman, House Committee on Digital, Information Technology and Cyber security. In this interview with YINKA OLADOYINBO, he spoke about the National Assembly, cyber crimes and opposition in the green chamber. Excerpts:
WHAT has the experience been since you started representing the people of Ibadan North-West/South-West federal constituency?
There are political and governance experience that are different from each other. Talking about political experience, when we first started, there were a lot of unknown, the terrains were very green. I was born in this Ibadan South-West local government, but to navigate the different cadre of politicians took a lot of bringing myself down to the level of all, to the level of the youth leaders, women leaders, the wards stakeholders just to see life from their perspective and that is what we call grassroots, you want to see the life they live and that means mingling, fraternizing, hanging out, dining with them, there is a lot to do in that perspective before you now seek their support towards your ambition. Then we have the local government leaders, they all have different political upbringing, people from the Adedibu, Adeojo, Ladoja caucuses and all the gladiators from Ibadan South-West/North-West, so you also have to bring yourself, humble yourself, get to see and play politics the way they play it, so from that political experience, I am not a novice anymore, there is nothing I want to do politically now that I don’t know how to deal with all the political class that we have in PDP, even in APC to some extent because I have a lot of friends among them.
Talking about governance experience, it is a bit tricky to understand what your constituents want. We all want good education, good health care system, good infrastructure, that has been the norm. We also want people that have the fear of God in government. For me to come this far in politics, I have been able to do my best for my federal constituency, Oyo State, and Nigeria.
What do have to say to the belief that this present National Assembly is docile and always pro-executive?
There is a political answer and an honest answer to that question and I am going to stand in the middle because I don’t want to be politically correct and compromise the truth. Yes, in Nigeria, the executive meddles or fiddles too much with the legislature. If we look at the state assemblies today, is there anybody that becomes a member of state house of assembly without the blessing of the governor? Is there anybody in their various states coming to the National Assembly without the blessing of the governor, who is the leader of the party in the state? So when a president is elected, he will fraternise with the governors and whatever the president wants he would sensitise the governors and he will get it, that is just the truth and that is the reason why people thought that the National Assembly is docile. We have a National Assembly today that consists of 85 percent graduates under the leadership of Rt honourable Tajudeen Abass, so it is one that is powerhouse of knowledge. Abass is a very versed leader, although we are from different political extractions, but I have a lot of respect for him, he is gentle and have a lot of passion for Nigeria, so under that leadership, there is nothing like rubber stamping. Considering the Tax Reform Bill, if we are rubber stamp, the House of Representatives would have passed it, but we did not, we opened it up for debate. We also have the digital economy bill, we want to digitalise the entire federal, state and private sector integration, which means we have to sensitise, now with the support of the World Bank we are going round the country, gathering all the stakeholders and talk to them so that when the bill comes up for second reading there won’t be uproar on it, a lot of people would have heard about it, they would have shared their views. The tax reform bill is a very good one, but I think the problem was the approach, lack of sensitisation, so we are not rubber stamp but we just tend to respect the leadership of the different political structure we came from. I know APC members that are not in support of the Tax Reforms Bills and I also know some PDP members that are against the bill.
Are you not concerned about the increase in cybercrime among our youths in the country?
I am very concerned, the cybercrime issue in Nigeria has two sides; the side of the economic hardship that has prompted our youths into crime, I am not making excuses, but there is a saying that “the hand that is idle is the devil’s workshop” so we have to be very careful how we address it. When you talk about cybercrime, we have to break it down into two, cybersecurity and cybercrime. Cyber security is only the right thing for any reasonable government to be concerned with because if you are going to play in the digital world your cyber security framework must be top-notch; otherwise, your infrastructure will be the playground for hackers, so we will continue to grow and mature our cyber security framework and implementation and we will continue to bring awareness to the youth because some of them are working for peanut: The masterminds, who are sponsoring the crimes are not in this country. Some of these people have big call centres that are state of the art and they use them for crime but the police, the DSS and other security agencies are collaborating to break the big net. We have to continuously re-educate our youth, I don’t believe we should continue to throw them in prison, that it is just a waste of human capital, what we can do is to rebrand the knowledge they are using for crime and use it to strengthen our economy.
In your personal capacity, what have been your contributions in the national assembly in terms of legislation?
I see a lot of people talk about bills, motions in the National Assembly without understanding that there is no member that would not contribute to bills or motion on the floor of the house. For me, I have contributed heavily whether I am the sponsor or I am not. I have few bills and motions that are hot on my list, the Digital Economy Bill is my big baby, because if that alone is what I achieve, it will be one that Nigeria will never forget us for. I also have a bill for the upgrading of the Federal College of Agriculture, Moor Plantation, Ibadan to a university status. We have some issues around it and we are trying to sensitise the people as there are some people that believe we already have a lot of federal institutions in Ibadan and that there is no need for another university so we are fighting the process to upgrade that college to a university. Talking about motions, I have raised lots of motions on the floor. We also a bill that I am a co-sponsor for the creation of Ibadan state, we have a lot of bills and motions, I think I have about 25 of them.
How will you react to the impression that the opposition members in the National Assembly have failed to give virile opposition to the ruling APC?
I don’t believe opposition has to be destructive, I believe opposition should be constructive, constructive criticism of the ruling party and the government; we are part of government so we cannot completely exclude ourselves from the process. We can be more vibrant as opposition but there are some political issues around that. But the way this 10th assembly came about the choice of leadership, when you have a speaker elected by 340 members everything that happens will sound as if there is really no opposition, but there is opposition, if there is no opposition few things would have passed on the floor of the house but went through a huge setback, so in a way we are not destructive to the executive, we are constructive when it is time to criticize what the executive is doing. For instance whether for or against, the 2025 budget, I am yet to take a position because I need to go through the details, analyse it and now see if the budget is good for Nigerians. I have not made any public comment in the budget I have not taken any position on the tax reform bills because I am also educating myself about the whole process. But the people should just give us a little time because they will see more from the opposition, after the second year we will all know if the executive has done well or they have failed the country. But we all know that there is a lot of hunger in the land, there are some reforms that the executive has implemented that have brought hardship to the people but whether it will be temporary or not it is 2025 that will decide.
Talking of dividends of democracy how much have you brought to the constituency?
We have done a lot in many sectors. In education, I have built schools, I have constructed ICT centres to help improve digital literacy in secondary schools, in healthcare we have renovated some primary health care centres and make healthcare accessible to our people. Talking about infrastructure, we have facilitated roads that people can see, right now we are building a very decent masjid for our people to worship Allah, we are also facilitating an Eid ground, that is for the religious side of our people because if there is no God, there is no life. So as a nation that wants to restore it’s moral values, education will help, religion will help, and the autonomy of traditional rulers, all of these will help.
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