98th Inaugural Lecture: LASU don cries foul against overweight pay of federal lawmakers, expensive  presidential system

Prof Abdur-Rahman Olalekan Olayiwola of the Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Science, Lagos State University (LASU) has lashed out very strongly at the Federal Government for running a cumbersomely expensive presidential system of government.

This is even as the multiple-degree holder berated the system for tolerating the provocatively unmerited overweight salaries being paid to the federal lawmakers, in particular, the Senators.

Prof Olayiwola trumpeted the annoying facts while performing his professorial discharge as the 98th inaugural lecturer of the best state university in Nigeria (LASU) on Tuesday, August 27, 2024.

Under the inaugural lecture titled ” Political Communication And Political Complications In Nigeria: Analysis And Action”, the avid LASU academic of of many laurels of excellence, buttressed his points dishing out a comparative analysis of salaries of senators across some countries of the world, including some African nations, whereby Nigeria pays the highest salary to its senators.

He punctured the federal government’s presidential system as too expensive coupled with the humongous salaries and allowances of the senators while impoverishing the hapless masses of the nation who voted them into power.

Amidst incessant applauses from the capacity-packed Buba Marwa Convocation Hall, the lawyer cum political scientist charged them audience saying: “If you love your country (then) share (this information) with friends and groups on Facebook, Twitter (X), Instagram and WhatsApp till everybody knows Nigeria’s problems.

Delving exhaustively on the lecture topic, the cerebral giant proffered that whatever governmental system the country may choose to adopt, there is a need for Political Communication in order to combat Political Complications In the nation.

He, thus, explained that Political Communication involves the transmission and exchange of information and messages between political actors and their publics.

He further tutored the audience that political is a two-way process even as he added that the scholars of politics, communication, mass communication, and political communication do agree that the mass media perform an indispensable in nation-building, national integration, combating political complications and ensuring the sustenance of democratic values.

“Let us shrink the frontier of political complications, violence, religious bigotry, ethnic chauvinism, tribal jingoism, hullabaloo, pandemonium, immobilise and expand the arena of political communication and peace”; Prof Olayiwola submitted.