The 5th assembly of the Ojodu Local Council Development Area ably led by Hon. Opeyemi Apatira has held its first public hearing after seven months of intensive deliberations and debates on how to move the council forward.
The event which held at the council secretariat on Tuesday, February 22, 2022, was basically a deliberation on the new bye-laws that would see to the improvement of the internally generated revenues in the local council area.
Speaking to the members of Ojodu LCDA at the event, Hon Opeyemi revealed that the legislative arm has proposed six bye-laws to improve revenue generation and ease infrastructural development in the council area since governance cannot be successful without appropriate funding.
The proposed by-laws are Point of Sales (POS) license by-law 2022, Establishment and maintenance of warehouses/distributors bye-law 2022, truck permit by-law 2022, tricycle operations permit by-law 2022, Street naming and renewal by-law 2022 and Construction development by-law 2022.
Speaking with Damilare Salami, City People’s Brands Editor at the event was the Executive Chairman of Ojodu LCDA, Hon David Olusegun Odunmbaku (DOS) eulogized the legislators and also promise to throw his weight behind the new bye-laws should it be required at any time.
“The essence of this public hearing is to get the community members involved in the process of the new revenue generation by-laws of the council. These are proposed laws but the truth is that they are long overdue. The POS operators, truckers and others have been operating within our community for a while now and they have not paid a dime into the coffers of the local council.
“We have to take care of our roads and provide other infrastructural development for our people but there’s no way we would be able to achieve all these without funding. These are avenues to increase our IGR so that we can do more for the people of Ojodu LCDA.”
Talking about enforcement of the law, the chairman revealed that the council would formally train its enforcers such that they would only operate within the confines of the law and would also properly enlighten the people concerned in other to prevent enforcement.
Also speaking to City People was Hon Apatira who further revealed the importance of the inclusion of the people in the debate of the proposed bye-laws.
“As lawmakers, we are not making laws for individual benefits. This is why we have called the constituents into this gathering for a public hearing and enlightenment and so that we can also have their inputs before the laws are being finally ratified.
“What these laws are intended to achieve is returning sanity into Ojodu LCDA. For instance, we have seen several situations where people are building and constructing houses and they have their building materials on the road because of space. This in return causes a lot of traffic and inconveniences for other road users. The construction development levy bye-law is intended to take care of that menace.
“My advice for the constituents is for them to come up with their proposals, we merge it with what we have so that we can form a stronger collaboration in making life-impacting laws that will benefit everyone at the end of the day.
“The community leaders here have been properly briefed and they have a maximum of seven working days to come up with their proposals and then we take it up from there, he concluded.
Present at the event was Hon. Adedamola Kasumu, Chairman House Committee on Sports, Lagos State House of Assembly. Chairman of Ojodu LCDA, Hon Olusegun Odunmbaku, Leader of the Ojodu LCDA legislative arm, Hon Opeyemi Apatira, APC LGA Caretaker Committee Chairman, Comrade Kayode Ajakaye and many other community leaders and constituents.
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