A’Ibom 2023: Senatorial aspirant profer solution to insecurity in Nigeria

Akwa Ibom South Senatorial district aspirant aka Eket Senatorial district, Dr Ekong Sampson, has said that if given the opportunity to represent the district, in 2023 at the senate, he would collaborate with his colleagues at ensuring that Human Rights issues are given their rightful place in the laws of the nation.

He made this disclosure while fielding questions from journalists on what he would bring to the table for the benefit of his people and Nigerians as a whole, in Uyo on Monday.

According to the two-term member of the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly human rights is central if insecurity, youth restiveness, and other social vices are to be diminished in the country.

“People are not talking about human rights, it’s central, once we apply human rights properly we have solved a lot of problems such as apathy, and insecurity among others.

“In Nigeria, we need to build stronger institutions, our institutions are very weak. We need people who are committed to making it strong and more vibrant in the legislature. With human rights, we would have put in place much stronger safeguards for our democracy, a safety belt for human rights. Human right is more critical in molding democracy.

“The problems of corruption, insecurity and infrastructural deficit can properly be addressed if we pay proper attention to human rights. The legislature needs to take up this fight strongly, human right is central to a civilized democracy we need to protect them properly. We need to go to the Senate well armed with what we call my work instruments which is the protection of human rights”.

Ekong who is the immediate past commissioner of environment and petroleum resources, said in the Senate he would collaborate with his colleagues to review the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) and other issues on the pending Water Resources Bill, noting that, his Senatorial district has a lot of IOCs operating there.

He frowned at the attitude of other aspirants from the Senatorial district who are not giving serious attention to these two issues as it affect the district.

“Sadly nobody is mentioning the weaknesses of the PIA, nobody is mentioning the water resources bill, I expect aspirants to engage the people pointing out the weaknesses in our legal system and how to address them. We should not be campaigning on sentiments but on issues on how to drive legislation in a way that the rights of Eket Senatorial districts are protected.

“Let’s look at the PIA and form a vanguard against some laws that seem to take away the rights of our people, as a legislator if you sleep, they will pass that completely finishes your people and see how we can tackle that”.

On his chances of getting the ticket with about five other contenders from the district, he said, “Akwa Ibom south in the Senate, I am running because zoning favors me, experience favors me and capacity favors me too. zoning makes for inclusiveness, I was officially presented as the preferred aspirant by my people, I have the experience a good part of me was in lawmaking. Lawmaking is a major component of democracy. Nigeria will be a safer place to operate if the operators grasp the rudiments of law and make policies.

On what would be his stance in the senate if the matter of state police is brought to the floor, he explained, “I am a believer in state police because we have to democratize security in this country. We need to make people to take ownership and see security as their own, state police will go a long way.

“In local government autonomy, I believe in autonomy but you need to have the right people to man the system because even if you have autonomy and you don’t have the right people to man, there will still be a problem we need to have the right calibre of persons in government and that is left for the electorates. We look at the law where there are weaknesses we review them, from there we get new matrixes in place”.