During Nigeria’s 2019 election campaign, Bankole Wellington, known as Banky W, ran for the Eti-Osa House of Representatives seat under the Modern Democratic Party (MDP). He said that, if elected, he would publish his salary, allowances and information about constituency allocations. It was a campaign pledge about transparency; this report records what he said before the election, rather than evidence of what was later implemented.
Mr. Capable made the announcement while speaking during a debate against four other candidates in Lagos on Monday, February 4, 2019, where he said accountability is one of the biggest problems in governance and hopes to lead from the front to change the situation.
He vowed to publish his salary and allowances as a legislator and be transparent in the spending of constituency allocations by consulting regularly with the people.
In his words,
“Most of us don’t know who our representatives are, talk less of their salary and allowances and constituency allocations that they receive every year most of the time to enrich themselves.
How I plan to address it myself directly is, first of all, I’ll publish what I earn as a legislator my salary, my allowance, the allocation given to Eti-Osa, I will publish it.
We will have town halls and an active constituency office to engage the community to say this is the allocation that we’ve received, this is what we intend to spend it on.”