Toba Oke Pledges Responsive Govt.

The Chairman, Ifako-Ijaiye Local Government, Oloruntoba Oke recently speaks about environmental issues in his council area and his plans to provide a responsive government.

How would you assess the level of environmental sanitation exercise in your local government vis-a-vis compliance by the residents?

It was fine. It was another interesting exercise. We have moved round and we felt we can still talk to our people to maintain a clean environment and we as government will continue to do what we are supposed to do by building more drains where necessary and desilt the existing ones to allow for free flow of water.

The level of compliance is not so encouraring but we will keep enlightening them on what they are supposed to do and also let them see the reason on why they ought to comply. I’m sure that between now and the next sanitation exercise the compliance will be increased.

Will there be any penalty for non-compliance?

Naturally, there will be penalty because the law will be enthused. In this case, bye-laws will be applied because when the people break the environmental or sanitation law, they must be punished.

As we were moving round, some buildings were been served notice because they did not do what they ought to do. Their environments were so dirty and they will have to provide an answer to all that and if of course, they will pay some fines for not doing what is expected of them.

In the course of moving around, some residents complained of flooding. How do you intend to tackle this menace?

That was why I told you earlier that we will continuously de-silt our drains. Some streets do not have drainage and we will have to construct for them. More importantly, now that the rains are here. We can’t say it is coming. It is because of this that we have to continuously desilt the drains and clear them of all refuse.

But some streets are so narrow that there is no space for drains. What do you intend to do in this case?

No matter how small or narrow a street may be, there would still be the need to construct water channel. It may be a one-sided thing but there is the need to put something there by creating a channel for water to pass through anytime it rains.

What advice do you have for your people with regard to environmental sanitation in this local government?

They should continue to do what they are supposed to to. They should continue to perform their civic responsibility of ensuring a clean and healthy environment and the only way they an achieve this is by cleaning their environment on daily basis.