Bamidele: Nigeria needs leader who can fix economy in 2023

The Senator representing Ekiti Central senatorial district and Chairman, Southern Senators’ Forum, Sen. Opeyemi Bamidele, has said Nigerians need a leader with scientific understanding to fix the nation’s economy.

Bamidele, who said this in an interview with newsmen in Abuja on Sunday, said President Muhammadu Buhari’s successor should have the recipe to save Nigeria’s economy.

“The level of corruption in the country explains my personal bias for who I believe should be the next president of Nigeria.

“My understanding of what Nigeria needs now is a president with the scientific understanding of what went wrong, what is to be done, and an antecedent of fixing broken communities, broken states, and broken situations,” he said.

Bamidele, who is also the chairman Senate Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters, stated that if the economy was buoyant, there would be employment and a reduction in crime.

“This is because more able-bodied people will survive either as business entrepreneurs or people engaged by companies or government agencies where they can build a reliable career.

“As much as possible, we also need somebody who will have the courage to take decisions without minding whose ox is gored, and without setting out to either protect any particular religion, tribe, or group of people.

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“We need Nigerians to come to terms with the fact that our search should be for someone who can help fix this economy and not someone who is coming to protect any particular religion.

“We need somebody who decisively understands what it takes to turn a nation like ours around so that we don’t get left behind by the comity of nations,” he said.

The federal lawmaker further stated that Nigeria was not practicing true democracy.

Bamidele said although the nation wanted democracy which was what it should be now but regretted that the country does not yet have the type of democracy it yearned for.

“This is because for me, democracy goes beyond coming to an office through a process of an election, yes, that’s the beginning.

“But the best we have had at the moment is a civilian rule which at least,  is better than a military regime,” he said.

He expressed hope that Nigeria would graduate from civilian rule it had in the last 24 years to a true democratic system where votes would count and leaders elected only through the ballot.

The lawmaker stressed that for Nigeria’s democracy to work, it should respect the rule of law which remained a cardinal element of that democracy instead of observing the rule of force.

Bamidele said Nigeria’s democracy should enthrone press freedom, human rights, and socio-economic rights as components of an example of proper democratic rule.

The Star