Honourable Terseer Tsumba, the Speaker of the Benue State House of Assembly, was one of the Nigerian parliamentarians that attended the 53rd Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference in New Delhi, India, recently. In this interview with John Akpodovhan, he speaks on benefits of the Conference, enduring legislative culture and other sundry issues.

Excerpts.

What is the country going to derive from your participation in the last Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference?
That was my first international engagement since becoming the Speaker of the Benue State House of Assembly. I attended the 53rd Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference which took place in New Delhi, India and it was worthwhile.

My India experience was very enriching. We had presentation at plenary and we had series of workshops that bothered on relationship between parliamentarians; workshop on our relationship with the executive, especially on the issue of checks and balances and to ensure that dividends of democracy are delivered to our constituencies. There was another workshop that bothered on human trafficking. Individual countries of the Commonwealth gave their experiences and what they were doing about this vice; people trading in fellow human beings. It is a new kind of slave trade that has taken the world by storm. We had another workshop on climate change and how it is affecting countries of the world.

What is the level of development in India?
I also benefited immensely from the commitment of the Indians. As a young man, when I was growing up, I had so many Indian teachers in school. The Indians I saw in their country were not what we were told. India is a third world country, but the level of development is now beyond imagination. Just before I left, a student designed and produced a car that uses solar energy. It was already billed for America for a competition.

Did you find anything we can learn from India on energy?
I noticed that the streetlight in the entire New Delhi was solar-powered. I stayed there for one week; we never had any problem with power for a single day. I noticed that the heaters in all the houses and all the hotels were solar powered. They divert their electricity energy to industries, while they use solar for basic uses around the house. These are the things we need to learn as a developing country. We need to learn and work very fast to achieve because we are still a far cry from sustainable power; we keep rationing power because of high consumption. For instance, in Benue State, we don't have industries, but when we start having them, there is no way public power supply can sustain them. These are some of the things I experienced during my trip to India and I intend to share them with our government so that we can also introduce them. Solar is God-given and we can tap it and it will go a long way in developing our economy and the standard of living of our people.

Which other areas did you visit apart from New Delhi?
We traveled to Agra, which is about three hours away from New Delhi, for sight-seeing and tour and I learnt a lot of things on that tour. The rail system in India is near perfect. Traveling by rail in India is just like traveling by air. The speed is comparable to any high speed car. These are the same people who came here to manage our rail system and it couldn't work. I keep asking myself why it worked in India but it couldn't in Nigeria. That is the problem we need to resolve among ourselves. You can only help yourself; nobody can come from anywhere to help you. Indians do not import cars. If you import cars, the levies you pay on such cars are extremely high, and if you are producing cars and you want to sell to the Indian community, you must set up the factory in India and also produce based on their standard. So, these are things we need to learn as a country. The Indian government has taken a stand and it has helped them.

How do you describe the lifestyle of Indians?
The people are not ostentatious like us here in Nigeria. I never saw any Jeep around; they drive very simple cars. The president of India, for instance, is driving the old Mercedes Benz car that our former Head of State, Late General Muritala Mohammed, was driving when he was killed so many years ago. They live a very low profile lifestyle. I learnt quite a lot from the people's way of life, they are quite determined. Once you are determined, you can move on in life. We all know that the population of India is a problem to that country, but they have decided that despite their problems, they would move on. These are among several other things which I leant. I want to encourage the Benue State government that since this is an annual event and the subsequent conference will hold in Malaysia, a media practitioner from our locality and more importantly, legislators from here should be part of it so that we can learn and rub minds with other parliamentarians from other Commonwealth countries. It was quite a rewarding experience.

Courtesy: www.tribune.com.ng, October 23, 2007