A former lawmaker in the Lagos State House of Assembly, Hon. Jude Idimogu, has called for patience from Nigerians regarding the ongoing reforms of the current administration, assuring that their positive impact will soon be evident. In this interview with OLADIPUPO AWOJOBI, the experienced politician criticised calls for a unicameral legislature and part-time lawmaking, arguing that such moves would undermine democratic principles. Excerpts:

We have had crisis in the economy and the government said that they would put things back to normal and they are about to present the 2025 Budget proposal, what is your charge to the government and Nigerians based on the reforms of the government?
The issue is that reforms take time, we keep on saying this. We have made some progress as you can see that the Port Harcourt Refinery in Rivers State is working now, Dangote Refinery is working and he has even reduced the price of his own fuel by N20 and we believe it will trickle down to the reduction in prices of goods and services. For the Port Harcourt Refinery that has just opened, it’s a good thing for the administration of President Bola Tinubu. There had been failures in the past because, when they gave dates, they would not meet up with the dates. But we keep on hoping for the best. Moving forward, we have talked about the reforms several times. The thing is that the government has been saving money from fuel subsidy removal. With this, the states and local governments now have more money, especially with local government autonomy. Our concern now is that the local governments chairmen should make good use of the money they are getting. However, the means of appointing government chairmen through elections is what the government should look at. There should be an independent electoral body for local government elections. It might not be the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), but the body should be independent. Look at the local government elections that we have had across the states, is it not like one party system for the states, where the party in power wins all the chairmen and councilorship seats? Each state has its own electoral commission that organises the elections. If it is what the government really can do, it would be better. It’s like all the states have done their local government elections now to have democratically elected local government chairmen and councillors. But how trustworthy is the process of their emergence. The government has to continue to fine-tune this process so that they can have the confidence of the masses. It would make it easy for opposition parties to come out to contest or else it would be the ruling parties that would be contesting the local governments elections. It has also been said that elections would be done in only the local governments, what happens to the Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs)? We don’t know. A pronouncement has to be made on this before we understand the direction we are going.

But the court has said that the Federal Government should transfer money to the 774 local governments only, so LCDAs are not recognised…
Yes, they base it on the 774 local governments, but the process has to be made better. But I would advise Nigerians to support the government of the day because if we don’t support what we have what can we do. As you lay your bed so you lie on it.

There is the issue of high cost of food items in Nigeria, people believe that this is because we have left agriculture and moved to the city, what’s your view on this?
That’s not the issue, it is insecurity, even if insecurity abates, the fear of the unknown for people to go to the farm is still there. Nobody wants to lose his life because he or she wants to go into agriculture, so the challenge of insecurity is still there. The only thing is for the government to give farmers confidence. Another aspect is transportation because the removal of fuel subsidy raised the cost of transportation as farm products are transferred from the rural areas to the urban areas. Fuel affects everything in Nigeria including cost of transportation to work, transporting goods and services and others. However, the government can encourage farmers by buying their items for storage so that they can sell to the people later. The Ministry of Agriculture has a lot to do in that aspect. But for me, the fact is that insecurity should be tackled. If farmers have confidence in the system, they would go back to farms, but how secure is the farmland. I have also said that National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) should be used to encourage corps members to go into farming. As they are leaving, another batch is coming and some of them would find employment opportunities in agriculture as a means of livelihood. We need to encourage many corps members to go into farming apart from some core professionals, who could be posted to work in other places. The government should provide farmland for corps members in the three senatorial zones in each state of the federation and provide facilities for them, give them security and water infrastructure. We should also encourage mechanised farming. If we do that, you will see that the problem of lack of enough food will go away

There have been criticisms that power is too concentrated at the centre, will you suggest that the Federal Government should release some powers to the state?
That has always been our position and President Bola Tinubu believes in devolution of power. That is the best thing to do, but he cannot do it alone, he has to go through the National Assembly. It’s a process, if all the members of both the Senate and House of Representatives believe in it, then it will work. I believe that devolution of power is good, but it’s not something that can happen immediately.

There have been agitations that Nigeria should have only one legislative arm at the federal level and that the job of the legislature should be on a part-time basis, what is your view on this?
Part time legislature would not be easy, apart from sitting, they perform oversight functions and go for committee meetings. If they are working on full time basis and Nigerians believe that they are not good enough, is it when they now do it on part time basis that it will be better? We have had unicameral legislature before, when we had parliamentary system of government, what happened then? I keep saying that it’s not the issue of the system that we are running, but it is about us as a people. Presidential system of government could be expensive based on the number of people involved, but it’s not about the cost, but the output. We should look at what we are benefiting. If we say unicameral, would that solve the problems of Nigeria. The other house that you want to cancel, do you think they would support this? However, if it is for the interest of the nation and the masses, there would be a lot of discussions and the people would look at the one that is better. They say it’s a bad workman that quarrels with his tools. Everybody is complaining about the 1999 Constitution, but a country like the United Kingdom has an unwritten constitution, and the people are not quarrelling. We that have one, why are we quarrelling? Man was not made for constitution, it is the constitution that was made for man. You that made the constitution can as well change it. Let us look inward and know what our problems are. If a majority of us are patriotic, we will not have the kind of problems we are having.

What do you say about our electoral system as there have been allegations of vote buying, rigging and what have you during our elections with examples of what happened in Edo and Ondo States governorship elections?
We don’t have perfect electoral system now. No matter the equipment and machines you provide for the election, you still have the human elements that operate them, so let us look inward. Some of these things are either done through the staff of INEC and the people, not just the politicians. If politicians give bribes, what of those who collect them. Another thing is that when some people fail, the process is bad, but when they win, the process is good. The man that just finished in Edo State as Governor was a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). He was a member of the APC in the first term before he crossed. However, there is need to overhaul our electoral system. I am happy that the National Assembly is talking about diaspora voting so that the people in the diaspora who contribute through money transfer home should have a say in our electoral system. I believe that before 2027, the National Assembly would rejig our electoral system after looking at the obstacles that we have had. But like I said, there is no perfect system.

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