Hon. Dipo Olorunrinu was a member of the Lagos State House of Assembly who represented Amuwo Odofin Constituency 1 from 2015 to 2019 on the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) platform. He later defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the twilight of his tenure.
In this interview, Olorunrinu spoke about the crust of local government administration, his passionate pact with the people and what Nigerians should do despite the challenges in the country.
You have been a lawmaker in the Lagos State House of Assembly and you contested for local government election in 2021 under the APC, what has been your experience so far and do you still have future ambition?
I do not take people for granted and I appreciate their support for me over the years. What keeps everybody going is hope and that is why Renewed Hope is the campaign slogan of President Bola Tinubu. For me, I have been okay and I give glory to God. After office, I went back to my business, I have always been a developer and I am more or less like a salesman. I come up with business ideas, there have been some challenges in the process. I have been involved in consultancy and the likes. I have never left my business, I was only in office for four years under an opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from 2015 to 2019, but I have never left my work. I extend the glory to the Almighty God for the knowledge. I just want to advise those coming into politics that it is a service to humanity. It’s an opportunity for them to contribute their own quota to the development of their nation. But I have to keep my family, myself and my structure going, which is also important for me politically. In doing that, I have go to work, I am a young man, we have to be prepared to give the batons to others, when we are leaving. My passion has always been to my people in Lagos State because I am a Lagosian.
You’ve been an Amuwo Odofin person as you represented them in the Lagos State House of Assembly, do you still have connections with them, and what is your view about LG administration in Nigeria?
I had Children’s Day celebration with the students and pupils on May 27, it was the 8th edition and 2,800 children were counted. It’s my own way of giving back to my constituents. The children don’t vote, buy I grew up with the idea of meeting the people in government such as the president, governor and the local government chairman. All that the people want from us is accessibility. With that, they will have peace and happiness. That’s really the definition of hope. I have been using the same phone number since 2008. If you calculate that, it is about 16 years now. I didn’t change the line. I don’t avoid people, I only tell them what I could do and why we should be together. It takes two hands to clap. I was born in FESTAC Town and I am not going to trade that for anything. Some people thought I relocated to Canada, I can’t live in another man’s land, I can only go there and learn there international exposure and bring it back to my country because my country is still developing and we need to be part of it.
Do you think our local governments are getting it right in terms of administration?
Like I said, the country is developing and it starts from the local government to the state and to the federal level. We are actually developing, we are no longer where we used to be even when we are not where we planned to be. People are more knowledgeable now, the government is more knowledgeable and the change is manifesting itself. The expectations of the masses are high. We are getting close to where we need to be, certain decisions have to be taken, certain things need to happen basically and I want to be part of it
So what would you do differently if you are given an opportunity to administer a local government, especially Amuwo Odofin LGA?
I had been their representative, and I have experience. Amuwo Odofin is a very important place. I have represented them as a legislator and I did some executive jobs as I was able to lobby the government for some projects. Most of the people in Amuwo Odofin are non-indigenes. You have people from the South South, South East and the rest. These are people that we all grew up together. I know them and they know me. They are people that need some levels of attention and if you don’t do that, they cannot assist you. These are people that are well to do and well made, though not all of them. They only put their money, where their hearts are and their hearts are with me. For me, I was more successful in office as a legislator, not because I know everything, but because of my association with them and I didn’t have a choice than to listen to them. These are people that are older than me, some of them are my age groups and they relate with me with every sense of sincerity. Even most of them contribute to what we do such as the Children’s Day. On what I will do differently, I am going to make sure that I am able to unite them back to our party. They have this wrong perception about the party that they don’t like me by taking the local government ticket from me in 2021. That was their mindset and I am now between the party and the masses. That was why they took the matter to court and I had to be careful. I couldn’t stop them from going to court over what they believed in. In 2023, the Labour Party defeated us with a margin of 42,000 in the Presidential Election. I had to go out to start to beg them and they were saying that the party didn’t like me. But I told them that it was not like that because we had procedures in the party and they listened to me. So, in the second election, the margin was just 17,000. I ran the kind of campaign that I never ran for myself within two weeks. I even fell down openly at the 23 Road Market and I was wounded on the head. It was like we were dragging the success of the party in the state. So, I will make them understand the values of our party because the APC is a progressive party and a democratic one. I also need to be careful in all these things and listen to the leaders of the party.
Do you support local government autonomy?
Yes the judiciary had declared it, for me, I respect the judgement of the Supreme Court. It will make the masses harness better expectations and the dividends of democracy from the Federal Government. The only way the Federal Government can be effective is when the local government is functioning properly. On the other hand, you can’t give what you don’t have. Even with the present system, it takes a very active council chairman to understand that whatever resources you are given from the federal or state government is never enough, you need to partner with the residents of your locality. They are also interested in it’s development, but they have to believe that you are capable. You have to show them that you have something to lose. So, I have something to lose if I don’t do my best for Amuwo Odofin, I was born there, I grew up there, I have siblings there and I am critical stakeholder. But I see it as a privilege basically. When people call you for advice or to know what is happening is a privilege, so your duty is to sustain them.
So what they demand is for you to involve them in governance…
I have been in both parties; the PDP and the APC and I know what is happening in the parties. I have also been with my people, it’s just to put everything together and make them work.
You have been outside the country and you know how things work there, what do you think is wrong with our local government administration?
Yes, I have been away like a year, and I am here now. Like I said, I am a teacher over there and I do some other things. It’s my passion to impact children. I also have a passion for election, I was an electoral officer there, not that I want to contest, but I want to have experience and bring it back to Nigeria here. I was a returning officer there. I can bring back a lot of experiences that I have there. Frankly speaking, we had the Festival of Arts and Culture in my area and that has helped the youths. FESTAC Town is the heart of entertainment in Nigeria, we had Tuface there, D’Banj, even the late Sound Sultan, Face and even Basket Mouth are our products. I am going to do a lot of things to bring this back, I am into entertainment myself. I have knowledge about those things. I need to revive our history and make things work in FESTAC Town.
For the elderly, we have a lot of programmes for them to take care of their health and test them for all sorts of ailments. We will have some subsidised healthcare for them. My wife is a pharmacist and she worked in many places including the State Ministry of Health.
What do you want the Federal Government to do to help the economy of the nation?
To start with, local government autonomy is one of the ways the APC has promoted itself. Also, I want you to know that the President is a very intelligent person. He knows all these things, my advice is that people should buy into his policies, reforms and give him some time to perform and allow these things to work, the removal of fuel subsidy was a wise thing to do.