 Welcome to The Advocate, where thought-provoking topics are discussed with no hoards barred here on Plus TV Africa. With basically quality spade by its name today, my focus is on the behavior of the last-minute officials and what their major purpose is. Tulu on the other hand speaks on reforming the justice system in Nigeria. Elijah speaks on the necessity of transparency and timeliness in leadership and finally Oluwa Kayode tells us not to blame the federal government but our state government. Sit back and after this break, we'll be here to dissect it all. Do stay with us. What's up with LASMA? First, I must state that it's super important that citizens respect officers and officials who have been assigned by relevant authorities to serve us. However, they really serve in us. If I curate all my unpleasant experiences with the officers of the Lagos State Transport Management Authority, I'm sure I'd make another cinema hit. Why have most of these LASMA officers decided to go beyond their job roles to execute what's not within their jurisdiction? Another critical issue that baffles me here is the behavior of a LASMA officer patiently waiting for you to get into trouble and then immediately surface out of the blues to get you booked. Where is the place of service by guiding citizens appropriately on the road usage? This is underlying behavior of extortion which is commiserate to their perception of you and the type of car you drive. I remember one of them jumping into my car at CMS and charging me 200,000,000 Naira and you know how it ended. When these officers are recruited and onboarded, I'm really concerned. What do they really communicate to them? Or is it just to hit the road, catch people and wicks their cars to their HQ in Oshodi? I don't even want to recount my experience at Oshodi. It was one of my most annoying experiences. Thankfully, I had to use my social capture to get out. A more serious note, when are we really going to do something about the unruly acts of these LASMA officers? The people that have been put in place to serve us and now more interested in extorting from us, this is one of the many reasons why driving in Lagos is not a pleasurable experience for me and many other people out there I want to believe. I even heard that they give them targets of defaulting vehicles and cars to a pre-hand. I don't know how true that is, but if that's anything to go by, is that even a proper KPI? If their success comes largely from this, then we can understand why they would rather wait for you to get into trouble than help you get out of trouble. Are we cursed from having a sane society that works? What's the way forward here? LASMA, KILON SHELLA. Only you can answer that. I don't have any cars. You don't have any cars. It's about the daily experience. I'm just kidding. For me, when you look at LASMA, so many things come to mind. First of all, yes, LASMA is to be blamed, but the state agency of the government that is supposed to do the tagging and putting all the signages on the streets, have they done it? Because I think, I'll give you an example, today, when I was coming, I got, okay, when I was living in VI last week, I stopped by a road. I'm not very concerned with the road on VI, so when I was driving into that street, I had to stop. Just when I was getting in, I stopped and I asked, is this one way? He said no. So I went ahead. Now, I mean, can I go through? He said yes, I went in. And when I asked, I was looking around to see all that guys, too, how they were reacting. Maybe this guy won't enter. So I went in. When I finished, came out for a while, I was going. I had to ask again, can I do a U-turn and go out this way? Or it's one way. Then he told me, only if you are driving, this is one way. Go through this way. Now, a typical legussian is in a hurry. Wouldn't stop to ask. And there is no signal, nothing showing, indicating that, no sign of anything, showing that this is one way. So you get in there and the last one official comes to you, who is probably poorly trained, who doesn't have a proper ability to, you know, not just communicate, but do analysis, read. You know, psychological, you know, be able to, you know, analyze you and see if you're doing the right thing or wrong and just assumes that you're lying or doesn't care and just arrest you. So a lot of things come into being. And I just say that they have, in a way, become a disappointment to the street, to the road or road users because they are there and they just make life miserable for many people. And what is even sad in my view is the way they won't carry out their duty. They carry it out with, in my view, less dignity. It's so sad. I imagine having a father who works a last mile and seeing him run after bosses in such manner, being insulted in such manner. There is no dignity of service. So they just work. They just go out and just do whatever it is that they feel they have to do. And that is wrong. So in the first thing is, first in first, we're talking last mile. Last mile, they need to get their acts together. They need to work better. From the leadership. From the leadership. And every other thing. I don't know, some will say, if you speak to some people in the last mile, they'll tell you that they don't have the full liberty to carry out what they want to do. That they have some, like you suggested, all this noise about controls and buttons being pressed from different areas. That's one angle. So last mile is failing in that aspect. The second one is the people themselves, the drivers, road users. We are so impatient, so rude, so intolerant at times that it will make an average road user lose his or her mind. Letting all the last mile officer whose salary is small, who is under the sun, who has been battered, and who doesn't even know what his child is going to eat because the salary is unable to. So that is why there's so much road rage between the driver and because I've been in a place, I was driving someday and an officer stopped me. When they did, the person stopped me. I was like, someone in my car said, what's he looking for? What's he looking for? I said, relax. They have the right to stop here. You don't have any excuse. When you are stopped, you must wait for them to carry out. When they are now out overstepping their boundaries, then you can't speak. And even though an officer of the law, you can't refundle an officer of the law. There's a limit to the kind of words you can use to an officer of the law. So we need to know all these things. You need to, even no matter what they do, the best way is to charge them to court. You get it. Recall it, charge them to court. That's it. You know, that's like a... That is a different okay. But this is an early one. No, I've seen people who have tried last month to court and they've won because they stood on their grounds. They had all their time. It's the people that have time. Exactly. I would like to mark my best sometimes. I don't have that kind of time. It's not the time. Elijah, we've not come to Tolu. What do you think? Well, this mother, you see, I agree with him to an extent, especially when he said he has the right to stop you. We citizens, we don't trust government. No, I don't want to use we. A lot of people don't trust government. I'm not part of the we. I don't trust government. Even though I know the air in Somalia, but I choose to trust them for the betterment of our country. But a lot of citizens don't trust the government. They don't even understand what governance is. Exactly. And then the people in governments, those people that are in government agencies, police and the last one, they themselves are abusing privileges. I don't understand this thing. Number one, like you said, uniform, I'm going to extend it now by extension to uniform person, not just last month. You don't have rights as a uniform person there. You don't have rights because you're a uniform person that you're off and doing citizen. Of course. At the other hand too, the citizen too should respect you because you're respecting the law. They said governments should be of laws rather than of men. So for the issue of last month, education is very important. They should be properly oriented and they should also learn how to communicate effectively with empathy. Let me give you an instance that happened during the lockdown, not during lockdown. I think after the lockdown, there was this couple of them, the period that they were enforcing newsmasks and all these things. It's not last month, this time right, it was police. I don't know if you saw the video trending. The woman was pregnant. She was in the car with her husband and the way that she came down for the car to ease her safe. The husband was trying to help her. The next thing was the police operated her. We are always your newsmasks. Blah, blah, blah, blah. The next thing, they refunded her and they wanted to arrest the husband. And they have children in the car. Now, let's assume the police were doing their job, but do you have to do it without wisdom, without empathy? You say that the woman is pregnant. Why did they refund it? It's not everything you must always want to arrest. You must not arrest everything. I'll give you a scenario. I remember I was watching a documentary on the internet. A woman was a very poor woman. I think it happened in the US. She was so poor, they didn't have anything to eat. So she, her child went, I don't know, she went to the, she and her child, they went to a particular shopping mall to buy something. They processed, like she stole something from the mall. And the shop owner called the police. The policeman came there and saw the woman. After assessing the whole thing, he said, is this matter, it's not matter of arrest, it's hunger. Okay, madam, he paid for what she wanted to buy, what she stole, and told her not to do it again. And let her go away. So it's not everything you must always want to arrest. It's not my intelligence. We should be wise, we should be wise. Tell you, on that note. Yeah, tell you, what's your experience with this whole Shinanigan? Yeah, you know, let's not start with my experience. Because I mean, I mean, Victor, you pretty much nailed it on the head. The problem is a problem of, of vision, you know, to start with, the vision is wrong. Once vision is wrong, the execution is wrong. You know, if someone that is supposed to protect and defend has been given the mandate to attack and punish, naturally, you know, everything else goes wrong from there. You know, to sign up to sailor claims, you know, claims you find that people have been told to protect and defend. So it's easy to feel safe when this is someone that has been, you know, mandated to protect and defend them. You know, in this case, it's different, you know, because their agenda, their objective, their vision is a bit different. So naturally, all the things that they do, just align with what they've asked them to do. I think the solution is very simple, to be quite honest. I think they need to depersonalize last month. I mean, 90% of the work that last month does can be done with technology. What is done in advanced countries, there's nothing to that work, irresistible, taking one, I mean, those things, everything can be done with technology. So in the sense of, I lose their jobs. So perhaps we want to take them to the control room and all they're doing is just, you know, printing computers. There's nothing that last month, you know, in fact, 80 to 90% of what the law enforcement does in Nigeria would help with technology. And you know, I'll speak more to it in my, when I talk about justice and the issues that, you know, we're facing with the justice system in Nigeria. Thank you so much, Tolu. All right, Tolu joins us after the break. Unveiling Lady Justice on reforming the justice system in Nigeria. Lady Justice, you most likely have seen her stretch you in front of a court of law one time or the other. In the event you haven't seen or you don't remember it, she's that lady with her face covered with a veil. Usually she's holding a scale of justice in one hand and the sword in the other hand. The history of this justice dates back to Roman mythology. Justice was one of the virtues celebrated by Emperor Augustus. Since the 16th century, the justice has often been depicted wearing a blindfold. The blindfold represents impartiality. The ideal that justice should be applied without regard to wealth, power, or other status. Let me repeat that. The ideal of the blindfold is that justice should be applied without regard to wealth, power, or other status. Justice is a word that has been, you know, seriously criticized, you know, in fact, can be described as a relative term because in itself, in some occasions, you know, justice is to one person, sometimes an end result of injustice to another. So in Nigeria, how is justice fed? You know, what are the challenges of the justice system in Nigeria? What are the limitations? And what steps has been taken to make justice available and fair to all who are in search of it? A little, you know, definition. My website dictionary defines justice as the process or results of using laws to fairly judge and punish crimes and criminals. Going by this definition, it is clear and apparent that justice is still to a large extent, you know, a foreign concept on many of the issues that were grappled with in Nigeria. As a matter of fact, on the global rule of law index, Nigeria ranks 108 out of 128 countries, 108 out of 128 countries and 22 out of 31 countries in the sub-Saharan African, you know, sub-Saharan African region. Again, let's talk about the rule of law. What's the rule of law? You know, the rule of law in plain terms implies that every person is subject to the law, including persons who are law makers, law enforcement officials and judges. In this sense, it stands in contrast to tyranny or oligarchy, where the rulers are held above the law. So now imagine again, the low ranking of Nigeria being 108 out of 128 simply means that Nigeria is trending more towards a tyranny than a country that respects the rule of law. Now, what are the issues responsible for this? Recent in-depth research carried out, revealed eight major issues to be deviling the justice in Nigeria. The issues are one, the unforthcoming informants. I'm sure many of us have experienced that. Let's not go and dive into that, you know. Number two, funding. Number three, corruption. Number four, training of investigating police officers. Number five, missing case files. Number six, delayed duplication of case files. Number seven, lack of forensic laboratories and insufficient number of trained forensic experts. And number eight, poor public records keeping. These are very obvious but very critical issues. And I advocate that the government should order to look at these issues for a quick resolution with the aim of getting back our country into a more civilized society. Well, you asked a question, and I think that you should start with that, that in your view, how has the justice system fed? I think the justice system has been unjust. Ha ha ha, point blank. You know, the justice system has been, it's, people don't have confidence in the system. And that is a big scare. Because no matter what you say, no matter what it's like, your appearance matters. At times you judge a book by the cover. That's one of the first experience you have. No matter what you say or do, it matters a lot. The Nigeria's justice system, my biggest problem with the justice system is not just that the fact that it might not get justice. It's the process of the justice. And why do I say not the fact that it might not get justice? I mean, people who are ordinary people go to court with their facts. And in one cases, that people have wondered, wow, so you could do this. There was a time I went to get passport from my son and when I got there, the man, I think I asked my wife to go, so I left at your something. And the person that looked at me and said, wow, okay, both of you are here, say yes, why are you asking? And he told me he said, last year, there was a case, somebody sued immigration and won. Why? They had a family issue. The wife picked the kids, got passport for them and took them out of Nigeria, relocated. And the man wondering that, how did my kids travel but they don't have a passport? Realized that she did a passport for them without his consent, so he took immigration. Which is not- It's supposed to be both parents' consent. In the normal legal process. And he took the immigration to court, of course, prolonged. But he won. So at that point, immigration, that was when they were very harsh and said, no, you must come, both parties must come, sign, and blah, blah, blah. What am I saying? I'm sure that has happened to so many people. And out of fear that I can't get justice, they haven't tried it. Exactly. And that's why I use the idea that when it doesn't look convincing, when you don't see, you're unable to have confidence in the system, then you let so many things go. And that is bad for our system. But like I said, the biggest fear for me is the fact that you start a process. And I think on this program, I spoke about the injustice of Nigeria's justice system some time ago, where I said, listen, we all talk about the influence of the executive. That's even a lesser devil to what happens in the injustice system. Because listen, I spoke about this, the kidnapper, what's his name again? Is it Imah or what's his name? The one that- Evans. Evans, yeah. That was arrested. I said, okay, when this guy was arrested, so many talks came about the crime he committed. All the people he had kidnapped came out and started ready to testify. The case was solid. Within that time, Ipeba was charged to court, was accused of collecting bribe for fixing a match. He was charged. He lost the case. He appealed the case. I think he had his sentence reduced. Between that time, I said, George Floyd. Case came up. He went to court and came back. Between that time and now, Bill Cosby was sentenced. The thing was tried. His sentence was reviewed. All this has happened. Yet, we are still in court over Evans's case. And that has nothing to do with executive power influence. This is just the process of the courts. So all the processes of our courts, people's nonchalance, the person who has the carry, the file like we hear and says, you have to pay me this or this is missing and that is missing. That's a loan because it's a problem because we have fine judges who criminals are scared to get into their chamber, their court. They know that when they get into their court, they've lost. We have so many fine judges. Yet, the system prevents and just causes a back and forth. And again, the way our police or our security agencies build cases makes a mockery of a justice system because on cases you go and you see in court and you're like, there is no nothing in this that you can use in winning a case. So a lot of things, if you're able to deal with this, then we'll be left with the executive arm of issues. And that will be amongst the big men. But for us as the average person, you can go to court. I know that you have justices when you're fighting one man. They're even when you see average people on the street, they don't even have confidence in going to courts. Even an average magistrate calls. They would not attempt it because they feel you wouldn't get it. Even the way the officers there will speak to you, the composure of the magistrate, everything just puts you off. And these are the challenges you are faced with. Well, this is a very serious issue. But I will say this first, we'll be just Ibi Remedium. I guess that's what you want to say, right? When there is justice, Mr. Tulu, we'll be just Ibi Remedium, right? Please, we're not your politics. I don't want to. No, he's describing. He's speaking of heavy lad. You are describing the woman the woman that is carrying the balance. I'm speaking to him. You are the woman carrying the balance. And then the sword, if you are found wanting, she cuts you. She's blindfolded because she's impassioned. Even if it's her child, she will still cut her child if the child is found wanting. So that's why they say when there is justice that is remitted, there is hope. We'll be just Ibi Remedium. That's what it is. So government should be of laws rather than of men. We watch movies, Nigerian movies now want to be specific how justice are being carried out in the matter of weeks. But in reality, is this so? Is it supposed to be like that? You get to cause a case that will take a year or six months will be lingering for several years. They keep back and forth. So we lose confidence in the system. There should be a total overhaul of the system. That is one number two. I remember I had the opportunity of interacting with one law student while I was in university some years back. And then she was telling me that in Nigeria, our system is advisory. Justice system is advisory. Why in the US is investigative? I don't know that you've had something like that. So can we have a clear distinction with the job of the police, another law enforcement agent and that of the courts? But sometimes I will mention the name of some persons of interest that are currently facing charges now in high courts or supreme courts in Abuja now. And you hear cases like people are already handling them. Government agencies, especially the DSS will hand you some of these people and almost treat them as though they were criminals as if they don't have any rights on their own. And the judges will be telling DSS, please do it this way. Yeah, they will not listen. So like everybody should know where your power stops and where your jurisdiction stops and respect it. And the other person or the other arm should do what they need to do. Let's make the system work enough of all these back and forth. It's more like a ridicule now. You know, Tolu, I'd like to just say that why, I mean it's a very interesting point that you've brought up, right? Why this hasn't really worked, right? Why he hasn't worked is because, and again, the offshoot of this is people are raped and they can't talk about it. You know, people are, you know, unlawfully defrauded, battered, you know, assaulted, physically abused. They can't come up because someone tells you the rape, I mean, I don't know if that is the right word to say, rapist or something. Someone that has raped somebody is moving free and making noise about it and being proud about it. In fact, moved on with his life and the rape victim, you know, is just there. So the process, like Kay said, is really so long, right? Again, bringing technology, how do we even really leverage for the legal system to bring justice quicker, faster, asexual, you know, easier, seamless to the people? Anything that stresses us as Nigerians, we want to avoid it. We're tired, we don't want to get rid of it. No, because talk, talk, talk, and nothing happens. So, and that's why, I mean, that's even the history of, you know, let me just run away. There's no need really, because running away is easier than going through the whole process. And you know what even makes it difficult, which we've all said, I alluded to it, but in a very silent way, well, let's bring it out to the fore now is that the first line of justice is not the court. It is the security agency. Exactly. So whether, and when I said security, whether last mile or the uniform men, whether last mile, VIO, that's where you first experience justice. Before you can now, you know, elevate it to the going to court or whatever. And once you get that wrong, no, it will be difficult to believe in the court system. Well, if we have to talk for the country to be better, please let's keep talking. That is it, that's what we're just going to talk about. But Tolu, we can go on and on. How do we bring this home? So, I mean, so yeah, I mean, again, you can go on and on with experiences and things like that. But I mean, I personally feel very strongly that new breed of people, whether I would like it or not, they're going to emerge. People that in respect, the role of law, people that care about the rights of citizens. So we're talking about rights now, we're talking about the role of law. What is that? It's very simple. Just means that nobody's above the law. It's really as simple as that. True. Truth is, there's no way in the world where they've gotten right 100%. We can see some level of progress. It looks like we're not even started. It looks like we're still fit us. We don't even understand where we are. We don't even know where we are. So, at some point, people start making those actions that take us to where we need to go. Okay. Please, do still with us. Elijah is next after the break. The necessity of transparency and timeliness in leadership. A stitch in time seems nigh. This famous phrase couldn't have said it any better. Leadership is in all its entirety entails all spheres of discipline, servitude, and timeliness. Is it true that the year before election, the government seems to work effectively? It is ridiculous to waste limited time on activities that aren't central to the core of an administration. This in every way defeats the purpose of the opportunity to be saddled with such responsibility and comes off as poor decision-making and mismanagement. This pattern of the end-minute execution is visible in poor administration and it comes along with the baggage of weak politicking and bad governance. The timeframe given to every administrative office is given based on feasibility, planning, and execution. Every timeframe in an administrative tunnel was structured to enable proper execution of the vision of the office and failure to follow these structures will lead to an irreversible lapse. Using a month to execute a project that should have taken years to plan properly and execute not only destroy the mission and outputs of the project, but also destroys the reputation of the parties involved. To reduce the repetition of this ugly pattern, the following factors must be considered. Transparency in leadership, workable policies, vision that are scalable, timeliness in planning, effective monitoring and evaluation. When all these factors mentioned are being considered by those at the hem of a phase, there will be a decline in project execution lapses and fraud. Development and continuity in transparent and workable administration would be assured. Let's ponder on these words. The speed of decision-making is the essence of good governance. Paij Guya is a politician and cabinet minister in the government of India. So Tolu, what do you think about this? Right, as usual. Politicians, okay. For me, I think you've hit the nail right on the head. There's just something magical about the year before election year. I'm sure you're like, what is this? There's just something absolutely magical about it. So talk does not be able to be done in two, three years. The year before election, there's just some spirit of efficiency and excellence. Just jumps on our people. And things got to start to get done. Roads start to get done. Hospitals get built. Schools gets renovated. Because like Tufay said, it's time to tell us another lie. I mean, but I think it's a serious problem of orientation. I say to people all the time, even leaders abroad in America, in the UK, people that have done democracy for hundreds of years and are trained to be leaders, to lead governance. They take courses in governance and leadership and strategy and decision making. Even these guys many times is to falter and make mistakes. In some cases they even fail woefully. Now that song has been prepared to hold these offices. Now imagine someone that has no clue, no training, no orientation, no preparation except for speeches, in many cases, senseless speeches that have been written by a more clueless person. Basically recite. So how would that person fail? This is not rocket science. I mean, to fail to plan is to plan to fail. That's exactly the problem we're having with leadership. Transparency is not even something we should start to talk about because we need a whole show to talk about transparency and leadership. You know, you have to not do that. You know, the time limit is just a magical thing that happens when it's time for them to get our votes again. I'll wrap up with this. Someone has said that, have you ever thought about how come their villages, settlements in Nigeria, they've never seen power before. They don't have power. They don't have water, you know, possible water. They don't have basic essentials of life. But when it's time for election, a polling booth appears in that location. A polling booth appears. But these are guys that have not seen power for years. But you can get a polling booth there when it's time to vote. And then what happens? Stomach infrastructure. Give them, you guys haven't visited an impoverished. So 2009-2009 guarantees with their votes for another four years. Thank you very much, Tolu. The last time I remember last week, while I was not last two weeks ago, I said something about copy DM, living in the moment, fixing the current problem. You know, there was an instance, something that happened during the lockdown, the saga around lockdown era that the government actually gave items out, relief item, and some of these things were hooded. And then some politicians had their phone to literally package this item using their own label. So they're using government property to campaign. Why? Because they're always thinking about the next election. You are not thinking about what are we going to do now to live, unless the next election takes you of itself. So I know the strategy is one to say something about, Mr. Karate, you have a lot to say. No, I don't know if I have so much to say, but I mean, when you listed the things that should be done, I was just asking myself, OK, do you think they don't know these are the things that should be done to be effective? I mean, not rock and roll. But you see, there's a country, OK, Ghana, when it's getting close to election, that is when the people wake up and make demands. That's when the nurses would go on strike. And they said that the agreement they had four years ago, or three years ago, has to be met. That's when doctors remember that this is happening. That's when all these institutions will start coming up. That's when you see communities tell politicians or the government that you promised to do this road. You didn't do it. It's four years, and you're going from that campaign. We are not going to vote for you. Now, you see, if you don't make demands, make hate while the sun shines. The best time to strike is when the metal is hot. That's better to strike and get the shape you want from that metal. And that is what we are not doing. I always say that politicians all over the world will always attempt to cut corners, even in America. If you listen to the news this year, last year, you'll have seen people that almost cut corners, did one or two things, and they were caught, and blah, blah, blah. But you see, in our own cases, we don't have a system that checks them. Then the people themselves are just used to, oh, don't mind them. They are foolish politicians, and they continue. So we need to look at all these things. Wow. These strategies. I mean, for me. Yo, I want you to address it from a behavior point of view, because you know you're a behaviorist coach. So why is this? It's like a recurring decimal. The year before election, things seems to work very well. They now suddenly remember that, oh, student need this. School needs this. This one needs that. But why don't you fix this thing? Let it be that you solve this problem, and the next administration should move on from there. You know, I'm not a politician, and you know. You can't speak for that. I've never got into the seat of power. So as much as I have good will, I've got some good value system. But I don't know how I'm going to act under that pressure. Oftentimes, we don't know what we're going to do and all of that. So for me, I think it's just rinse and repeat. So and if the trigger is not fixed, it's going to continue being a rinse and repeat strategy. Any strategy that works, I mean, it's business sense. If it works, we don't need to change it. That's it. It's been working, and we don't need to change it. And that's what I think. Well, for us, we Nigerians, it's important for us to focus on making the system works. When we make it work, then we shouldn't bother ourselves about what's happened subsequently, because you take care of yourself. A little work nowadays is next after the break. Blame the states, not the federal government. As we approach 2023 elections, tempers are high. Many are agitated, but a lot more are confused. Our state of Confucianism is not new. It's been with us for so long. Our election lecturer, Kunle Lawal, has taken us through a series of mind-opening revelations on this program, identifying the right, limitations, and constitutional responsibilities of each arm and each tier of government. But let me cut the chase and address this seemingly controversial topic. Blame your states, not the FG. It will look like I'm making excuses for President Mohammad Ibuari, but for, but far from it. His tenure is coming to an end, and historically, not much happens during election year. My concern is more towards 2023, who takes over from him? And how do we make them, the federal government, state, and local government, accountable to us? 2022 budget summary, it goes this way. FG budgeted 17.1 trillion Naira, Lagos state, 1.7, River state, 483 billion. Cardinal state, 278. Ogun state, 350 billion. Adamawa, 163 billion. Niger state, 211 billion. And the lease goes on. So let's work with a median value of 10 trillion Naira budget for all states. That's estimating their budget at 300 billion for each state. Or let's even bring it out to 200 billion. That'll be like 80 trillion Naira. We're so concerned about FG budget performance, but how often do we query state budget performance? I saw an article about Governor Saoulu buying high-speed trains from Spanish manufacturers in Milwaukee, USA. And yes, it's been confirmed. Then I came across another report in 2016 where Governor Ambody was said to be about to buy off some trains for Lagos Red and Blue Rail line. The same one Governor Saoulu is about funding. What happened to the promise in 2016? What about the budgetary allocation? Or has it become an inappropriate appropriation bill? In Lagos, the government has the neighborhood security outfit funded from tax, payers, money. The purpose is because security is local. How well do these institutions perform? What is the quality of the intelligence they gather? States and local governments have more roads than federal government in any state in Nigeria. So where a lot of roads are not car-worthy in Nigeria, it is most likely the faults of the states and local governments. Yet, all we hear is complain about how nothing is working in Nigeria and dump all the blame on Nigeria. By that I mean federal government. Now to the elephants in the room, the economy. The escape route is we need to move some things from the exclusive list to the concurrent list. I'm trying to sound like a politician there. Many states cannot generate revenue because they do not have access to the rich resources of their land. That is just diversionary tactics to aid the inconsistencies and debts of ideas plaguing our state's leadership. Before the discovery of oil, state survival and agriculture, ground-up pyramids in the North, farmer plantations in the East, cocoa in the West. Now let's take Western region. In the West, it developed with cocoa money, built cocoa house in Lebanon, set up WNTV, built Obafeme Olo University and many others. Prudent management resources. I know you might say that cannot be replicated again. Times have changed. Even abroad, in other states, states have control over resources. Truth is that I agree. States should have control over their resources. But let's look at the statistics. According to Texas Oil and Gas Association website, that's at texoga.org, Texas oil and gas industry made history when it paid 16.3 billion dollars in taxes and state royalties in 2019, highest paid ever, or thus far. Now, that is huge. I can only imagine what reverse state can do with that amount of money. But that's not all. Let's look at another statistic from the same state, Texas. According to data available on texasagriculture.gov, Texas government made 24 billion dollars from agriculture products in 2017. Now, every state has control over agriculture. What are we doing in our states? We have control over traffic regulations. What do our roads look like during rush hour? How many new projects have we started to reduce travel time? I was having a conversation with a colleague and he reminded me that the last time a major project happened in Lagos was in the 80s when the 3rd mainland bridge was constructed. I stand to be corrected though, but if that's the case, isn't that over 20 years ago? And if the red and blue rail line is not completed this year as promised, what would be said of Lagos? A mega city, desiring special status. Now, one last thing before I go. Do you know that according to the constitution, provision of electricity is in the concurrent legislative list and not the exclusive? State House of Assemblies can make laws for the state with respect to electricity and the establishment in the state of electricity power stations. The generation, transmission and distribution of electricity to areas not covered by the national grid system within that state and the establishment within that state of any authority for the promotion of management of electric power stations established by the states. There are mitigating factors, we must all agree, which the states can address if they so desire to provide electricity. But we will discuss this on another day. For now, long live the federal republic of Nigeria. Well, I would say the government should try, state government specifically, let me just leave us as a key study. We spend several productive hours on the road. Who's fault is it? The federal government or the state government? So if they really want to generate more revenue from the citizens who are working, they should work on reducing the number of times we spend on the road. So that's, we start with that. Okay, and we hold you down there. For me, it's very simple. I remember in classical math, I think it was El Clasico. I don't know if it was El Clasico, it was a very, when Messi was still in Barcelona and everybody wanted to mark Messi, but Messi was like the big, and the person that they used, I think it was Suarez or something, right? Or it was Suarez or the other guy. And he was once scoring the goals. And so the idea was to distract the defenders with Messi. He wasn't going to be the hit man. And then everybody goes to him, then the hit man scores. So I mean, I agree with you. There's always this federal government, you're the problem and all of that. And people are minute by minute, a starting and sucking the state drug. Why are we not holding our local government counselors? I mean, I say, yeah, but can't I say, what is the state of, what's the level of progress about this? And I think to conclude on this is, I myself, I'm holding myself accountable. I need to start attending this meetings, when they call for it. So I leave, oh, they have some bunch of non-intellectuals. Let me drive off and go. Let the intellectuals get involved. I need to get to those meetings and you know what is happening. Play on road. Yeah, they talk. Do you agree with us anymore, state? Absolutely agree with you. I mean, just think about it. Just look at the numbers. There's only one federal government, but there's 36 states. So there's corruption going on in the federal government. It's going on 36 other places. Oh, perhaps you less even take a eye away from that one federal government and focus on the 36 other people that are not responsible. That is not like it said, to let the federal government go anywhere because in some cases, what's going on in that place, let's not even start stealing. I agree with you that people start getting involved in their state government, in their local government. I mean, there are things that it has to ask the governor for. I go somewhere and ask myself, is there a chairman in this local government? He said, the councilors. They understand. I mean, but in some cases, people are responsible for little things. Everything is not a worry's fault. There's a lot of things that goes anyways. That's it. Like someone said, when a husband and wife fight, it's worry's fault. Yeah. If he falls down, he's gone. When he threw death on the floor, he's worried for it. And when I was putting these together, what came to mind is this man would be out in about 13 months or let's say even 15 months there about. Who comes next? We'll start the same activation. The same cycle. For another four or eight years. And we, the people remain the same. And I'm sure by then, the 5,000 you get the volume and I've dropped further to 2,000. So you're getting less. I see a ransom rapid strategy. Yeah, exactly. So, well, we can go on and on, but all we can say now is thank you for your attention while the program lasted and we hope that our conversation resonated with you and that in some small way, encourage you to contribute to your immediate environment. Little drops of water, they say. Make a mighty ocean. Don't forget that Advocacy continues on our social media platforms on Facebook plus TV Africa, hashtag the advocate NG and on Twitter and Instagram. Yes, Twitter is back at plus TV Africa, hashtag the advocate NG. To catch up with previous broadcasts, go to plus TV Africa dot com forward slash the advocate NG. Do not forget to subscribe to our YouTube channel plus TV Africa and plus TV, plus TV Africa lifestyle. Join us next week. Same time on this station. Let's keep advocating for a better society. See you next time. Bye.