Governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Oyo State and three-term Senator from Oyo Central, Senator Teslim Folarin speaks to DARE ADEKANMBI about the expectations of Nigerians from the government Senator Bola Tinubu, what should be priority areas for the government among others.
Nigerians are hopeful the economy will get a lift good under the incoming president, Senator Bola Tinubu and given his antecedents as governor of Lagos State. Is such hope not misplaced given the enormity of the challenges the economy is facing?
Nigerians are excited about Senator Bola Tinubu’s presidency. He was voted for as president because of his track records. Like you said, he did it in Lagos when he was governor for eight years. How did he do it? He assembled the best brains and look at what the team did in Lagos. The expectation is that he will now do it for Nigeria. It is not going to happen overnight. I am also very excited about his coming as president. Nigeria is our country and there are so many things that are wrong in the various sectors, health, economy, security and so on. He has the courage and competence to lead the country at this time. I am confident he will provide the kind of leadership the country needs at this time.
What specific areas would you want him to prioritise for Nigerians to get immediate relief?
It has to be the economy. As we speak, the fuel subsidy thing is driving the country to bankruptcy, if we are not already bankrupt now. The level of our indebtedness is quite worrisome. Very soon, nobody is going to lend Nigeria money. Subsidy will have to go just as it has been removed now. What Nigerians now expect from his government is the palliative that will cushion the effect of subsidy removal. I read in the papers that they [Buhari’s government] tried to take $800m loan and they were going to pay N5, 000 to the most vulnerable for one year. That is not the way to go. You have to ask yourself the question: what does the common man on the street use petrol for? One, they need it for transportation. Two, they need it to power their generators for electricity. I think we need to quickly address the issue of electricity and make it easy for anybody who wants to invest in that sector to do so. There is the need, in my view, to invest in the Mambilla Power Plant. That has not taken off and it will take a minimum of four to five years to complete. Now that subsidy is removed, there will be money available to spend on education which is very important and so on. But the key think is the economy.
What I think the president should do now is to call all the governors and ask them what they can do in their states to generate money. When government needs money, it can do either of two things: borrow or raise taxes. As a country, we have reached the level where we can’t continue to borrow because we have reached an unacceptable level now.
Even IMF and the World Bank have warned against further borrowing…
Exactly. We can’t keep borrowing to pay salaries. No bank will be ready to do that. The second option is to raise taxes. But many Nigerians are already depressed. But I do know there are a lot of loopholes that will be closed, a lot of money to be generated from the black market, I am sure. The answer is for us to grow the economy. We said it during our own campaign in Oyo State that we need to grow the economy. So, every state needs to come to the table to say this is what they can do and to see how the Federal Government can plug in to help those states. The economy has to be quickly addressed and I am very sure Asiwaju will do it. I am sure he has his master plan. He did it in Lagos and Lagos is a success story. So, how they will replicate the Lagos success story given the complexity of Nigeria is going to be interesting.
You talked about the unacceptable level of indebtedness of the country to IMF, World Bank and even China. But you are part of the outgoing 9th Senate that kept approving every loan request from Buhari. Why are you now complaining?
Yes, but you have to understand that the National Assembly is about the majority. To be fair to the outgone president, a lot of the loans he took were for capital projects. There is nothing wrong in taking loans as long as you are going to deploy same to build infrastructure such as the rail system and others. The idea is that such project will begin to generate revenue to repay the loan. The point we are making is that it gets to a level where we can’t keep borrowing and we have to look for other means of raising money. To raise tax on a depressed people will make the government very unpopular at this time. Even in the Western countries, tax issues are always very thorny. Governments have been known to fall in Western Europe on the issue of taxation. Taxation is always a big issue in UK elections because you have to spell it out. The difference between us and them is that in our country, a politician will say they want to build an El-Dorado and nobody will ask where the money will come from. But over there, you will have to spell it out to the details. If you tell them the money will come from taxation, you are not likely going to win. But the exciting thing about Nigeria is that there is so much potential for us to grow the economy. That is very exciting. The issue of the items in the Exclusive List has to be dealt with because you can expect a country to grow at the same pace. We have to free every state because there is so much potential in every state. Not too long ago, I saw a policy paper which contains the list of natural resources in every state. It is quite unbelievable. We should not be in this state. The problem is that if gold is found in the ground of the house I am speaking to you from, suddenly the house becomes the property of the Federal Government. That has to be changed. We need to allow true federalism where every state will be allowed to move at its own pace and pay tax to the centre. Currently in the UK, agric produce is allowed to be brought in without paying tax. We should be taking advantage of that. I am sure Asiwaju is already thinking about how to grow the economy. If his government gets the issue of power supply right in the next two or three years, that will go a long way, help a lot of industries and more industries will spring up. The Dangote refinery will be helpful in the area of fuel supply and we need more of such initiative so that there will be competition. Once competition kicks in, prices will fall. If there is anyone who can do all these, it has to be Asiwaju Tinubu.
You have spoken about the economy, what do you have to say regarding the political structure? Should there be restructuring, should we return to parliamentary?
To change a system of government is not the only way to tackle the issue of cost of governance. I agree with you that the presidential system is too expensive because we are spending quite a significant percentage of our budget on recurrent expenditure rather than on capital projects. It is an issue really. Also, so many states are not viable today. It is not just about the Federal Government; it is also about the states. The most important thing is we will have a government. I agree with you absolutely that the bureaucracy is too big for this economy to sustain right now. The cost of governance is too high. Even if you bring a parliamentary system, it will still be an issue. To solve this problem, we need to make money, create an enabling environment that will lure investors to bring investment. If the majority of Nigerians want us to return to the parliamentary system, so be it. But we need to plug a lot of loopholes. The Federal Government came up with TSA. Some officials have since found a way around it. I feel for the new government. If we want people to bring their money to invest, uninterrupted power supply must be the goal. If that is the only legacy of Asiwaju, we will never forget him.
Some people have argued that we don’t need a bicameral legislature at the centre given the huge amount of money the institution gulps, about N160b every year. Why can’t we scrap the House of Representatives and retain the Senate to cut down cost and ensure equality of states? No matter how big or small a state is, it produces three Senators, including Bayelsa which has just eight local government areas.
Are all the states of the same size? If you look at the House of Representatives, there is proportional representation. In Bayelsa State, for instance, how many Reps do they have?
They have five
The idea of a bicameral legislature is for checks and balances. Of course, now that we don’t have money as a country, I know all these issues will come up. When there was money, nobody was complaining. In 2007 when the economy was good because oil was selling above $100 a barrel, nobody raised issues. It is normal. Everybody is thinking about where we can save money. If Nigerians say we should have a unicameral legislature, then I will vote for the retention of the House of Representatives and scrapping of the Senate.
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