Why I want to represent my people at the House of Reps-9ice

Adegbola Akande Abolore popularly known as 9ice speaks on why he wants to serve his people.

 House of Representatives.  When did you join party politics?

I have been into party politics for quite sometimes now.

For those who don’t know, under what political platform are you aspiring to realize your political ambition?

I am a member of All Progressives Congress, APC. So certainly I will be contesting under the platform of APC.

When did you join the party?

I have been a member of APC for some years now.

What is your manifesto? 

My manifesto is chronicled into what I call CARE, and all my plans are programmed under care. We have already identified the pressing needs of our people and have decided to make sure that those needs are properly tackled and by the grace of God we will solve them before any other
thing. You and I know the importance of education, so we will be awarding scholarships to students who are brilliant, starting from the primary, secondary, up to the university level. Our care initiative
will take care of that. Care for the less privileged in our society, care for the elderly, health care, community care, care for pregnant women, care for the widows and so on. In fact we have a total package under CARE. We also have good programme for agriculture, because food
business is a very serious business, whatever you give people, if people are still hungry they will curse you. So we are going back to agriculture to provide food and employment for our people. We also
have what we call, ‘YOU MUST WORK’, you must work is also in our ‘WE CARE programme. You must work, is specially designed to create employments for our teeming youths. I have said it before that if the youths are gainfully engaged, they will never get involved in criminal activities, they will not have the time for violence and perhaps involvement in crimes, they will not become political thugs. So we want to make sure that our youths are gainfully engaged. This is the only way our society will be protected and conducive for everyone. So my manifesto is very simple. CARE or WE CARE, whichever one you choose, it would go a long way. If you Care for people, you care for the society. 

Your manifesto is very impressive and very attractive. But that is always the issue in this part of the world, politicians make good promises when they need votes, but when they eventually get the votes, that would be the end, they later become tin gods that the people must worship. What is the guarantee that when you get elected you won’t abandon your WE CARE programme and people that elect you into power?

 This is one of the main reasons I want to represent my people at the House of Reps. You see,  If there must be any change, then the people who needs the change and ready for it must rise up and make change possible. We must not continue sitting at the corner to criticize all the time, there are times to talk and times to walk. Evil they say persist where good men chose to remain silent. We must never abandon our country for people who have been failing us all these years and expect that things will just change miraculously. We can no longer abandon our society for those who don’t care to continue to toss our lives as they like. No, it doesn’t work out that way, it is our responsibility to be involved in the welfare and development of country, and we must not sit at the corner and expect
miracle to happen. So we must make that change possible.

You are based in Lagos and far away from home for a very long time. How well do you know the people of the constituency you seek to represent at the House of Reps. how close are you to your people?

I am from Ogbomosho, the blood runs in my vain. Aside that, there is hardly any week I don’t visit home, I spend as much time I spend in Lagos in Ogbomosho and Ibadan. I visit home regularly and I also
interact with my people very well. People have been trooping in and out, pledging their support for me. If I’m not home regularly, this will not happen.  People have been showing support since I declared my intentions to run for the poll.  From the way we relate you can see that I am not a stranger to them and they are not strangers to me. We are brothers, we are friends and above all, we are family. I have never abandoned my people and they have never abandoned me. So the question of being on ground does not arise.

People have been trooping in and out, but that is always the situation around politicians, particularly during elections. Most times their aim is to grab what they can and walk away. Are you convinced they really want you but not deceit? 

Yes, you might be right about people looking out to see what they can get, but as you can see for yourself, maybe you still need to do some more walk around here. We don’t share money or rice and beans. We don’t play the politics of money or that of the stomach. No, we don’t
do that, we are not part of those who have deliberately impoverished the people so they can take advantage of them during elections, those who have deliberately refused to provide jobs for the youths so that they would be available for them as political thugs during elections.
No, we are not like that, we play what we call, the POLITICS OF INTELLECT. Idealistic politics, where we go to the people directly and convince them on the reasons a change is necessary; convince them on
why it must no longer be a business as usual, on why they must not sell their conscience for rice and beans, why they must not sell their vote for money, no matter how much. No matter how much because the money will finish within few days. Then what next? they will now have to wait for another four years before they come back again to do the same thing. No way! how long must we continue with all that? We need change and that change is now! We must all join hands together to make change possible, including being good citizens.

Now that you have touched some topics which involved corruption and corrupt practices. If I may ask, what is your view on corruption in Nigeria and what do you think should be done to curtail it?

Corruption as you and I know, is a very serious problem in Nigeria. You can agree with me that corruption is one of the main reasons we have not been able to fulfill our potentials as a nation, even with all our natural and human resources. Now, one question we must all ask ourselves is, What is corruption and who is corrupt? You see, these questions are very important because we may never be able to fight corruption if we can’t define corruption and who is corrupt. Corruption has eaten deep into the soul of this country and from the way I see it, we must acknowledge the fact that there is corruption before we can fight it. Starting from the top man, down to the man at the bottom end, corruption has become our norms. 
So what do you suggest as the way forward?

I think I have already answered that. But if you want me to go bit further on that then I will say, before you can stop corruption you must first stop corrupt people from being in position of leadership, you
must stop them from being in a position of authority where they can have access to our treasury. If you give fish to Mr Rat to look after for you, what do you expect him to do with it? Surely he will not look
after the fish ,  rather he will eat it. Even eat the one you did not put under his care. It is the nature of Mr Rat to steal fish and eat fish. The bottom line is, don’t put a corrupt person in charge of your money because the money will develop wings, stop corrupt people from being in charge of our treasury. Give opportunity to those who have the passion for the job to do it. Allow only those who have the interest of the masses at heart to do the job. Allow those who has humanity in them to do the job. That is the only way we can tackle the issue of corruption in this country. But if we chose to continue with the same method, the same approach we have been used to all these years, since we got our independence from Britain in 1960 till now and expect any miracle to happen. Nigeria is 54 years old. We still battle instability of light, bad roads, bad welfare of the citizens, corruption etc, how do we move forward? If you collect money from politicians before you vote, am sorry you have sold your future. Live of your children, wife and entire family are at stake if you collect money in order to sell their vote. We need to continue educating people. Your destiny is in your hands. 


In your own opinion, what do you think is the way forward for this country, considering all the political crisis here and there, the security challenges and the prediction by the American intelligence report some years back that Nigeria may disintegrate by 2015. Do you still believe in one Nigeria?

I believe in Nigeria, I believe in one Nigeria because I know that God has a good plan for this country. Nigeria is God owns property. If you just sit back and ponder over all that have been going on in this country since we got our independence from the Great Britain in 1960 till now, and how we have been surviving it, you will agree with me that Nigeria is God’s own property.