Edo-born Canadian Police officer and Labour Party aspirant in the 2024 governorship election in Edo State, Ogbemudia Bassey Osagie, has pledged to construct a security dragnet around the state to attract and create an enabling environment for investment.
He said being an Edo son with 24+ years of experience in the Toronto police as a staff sergeant, he possesses what it takes to safeguard the state and attract investors to the state.
Osagie stated this in Benin during a recent chat with Journalists and said a lot of Edo sons and daughters who have big companies in the US, Canada, United Kingdom, and other countries are willing to come to the state to invest but they are scared of coming because of insecurity.
He noted that after many years of working abroad, he decided to come to Edo State to put his wealth of experience to use.
He said: “I have had the privilege to serve the people of Toronto. That same ethical value, that accountability, that transparency, that mindset that you need to do something good for your people is what I have brought to Edo State.
“What I am going to do as Edo State governor is to bring Toronto to Edo State so that we can start to see progress. Our people need change.
“Our major priority is security. Without security, there cannot be success; there cannot be economic development. You need an efficient and effective law enforcement agency to keep people in check. These are my vision for Edo State.
“All our people I consulted in the US, Canada and the UK claim they cannot come and set up their factories because the state is not secured. We have many of our people who own big pharmaceutical companies and others, but they said they can’t come home because our state is not secure.
“So, as an international security expert, I will build a security dragnet around Edo State so that our people in the diaspora will start coming home to invest. Trust me, I have served in the white security for years, but the whites will not come and fix our security for us. We will fix it. We are going to persuade our people to come and invest.
“We will create the enabling environment for industries to flourish in Edo State. We have mineral resources, but we have no industries. What I am going to do is to build factories so that we can be able to produce instead of consume.”
He promised to build the youths of Edo by ensuring they acquire modern technologies. He also promised to give farmers soft loans so that there could be food security.
He said: “We need to go back not only to secure our farmland but farming. We will give our farmers some funding. There are a lot of young men who want to go into farming, we need to give them loans. That way, we will reduce food insecurity in Edo State and Nigeria in general.
“During my tenure as governor, God willing, there will be no federal road. Any road that my people drive belongs to us, and we will not leave it to collapse.
“No country can develop without electricity. You can’t have a factory without electricity. What I am going to do as governor is to look into the power problem and solve it. We plan to provide 24-hour electricity to our people. It is not rocket science. If the companies we have in Nigeria cannot do it, I will bring Canadian Hydro to look into our power structure and fix the electricity challenge.”
