By Dirisu Yakubu and El-Ameen Ibrahim
The Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has promised to build a broad-based framework to tackle the perennial security challenges facing the nation if elected Nigeria’s president in next month’s election.
Obi, who stated this on Sunday at the People’s Town Hall 2023 organized by Channels Television, said if elected, security personnel would be well motivated to perform their duties optimally as expected.
He said, “for our men and women in the security, we will ensure they are motivated and supported and properly insured and make sure they are confident their families are protected in case something happens to them. All procurement in the Military and other sectors must be transparent. It must be measurable and visible. The days of doing things hidden are gone.
“We need to involve every community in Nigeria in security where each community secures their community and shares information with other communities.
“We have to be alive for the constitution to be amended, not wait for all of us to be dead before doing something. I will use my powers as the President and Commander-in-Chief to secure Nigeria as quickly as possible,” he pledged.
Obi who promised to exhaust all carrots before bringing the sticks, recounted a personal experience when he visited an Internally Displaced Persons’ camp in Benue state.
“I visited an IDP camp in Benue state. I listened to their issues and told them that if I’m the president of Nigeria, ‘I will take your issues personally because as long as you are in IDP camp, Nigeria and Nigerians are in IDP camp.”
In his opening remark, Obi’s running mate, Datti Baba-Ahmed, expressed the readiness of the former Anambra State governor to tackle critical areas that would unlock Nigeria’s potential.
“We will address unprecedented, aggravated corruption. We deserve the votes of Nigerians because this is turning out to be an election based on character backed by records, competence, and capacity. Northern Nigeria is paying a massive price today because they have been voting based on ethnic and religious lines for a long time We are going to stop the killings and start the healing; stop the stealing and start the keeping; stop the slide of our currency and start the climb of our society,” he said.
On what informed his decision to join the presidential race, the former Anambra state governor said the desire to see a new Nigeria where citizens would be proud of their country motivated him to seek the people’s support.
“I decided to be part of this race because we want to start turning Nigeria around for Nigerians. We want to build a nation where everyone will be respected,” he said, stressing that any leader who wants Nigeria to succeed must take away his personal interest and that of his friends and groups. That is the only way Nigeria can achieve and we are ready to do that,” he assured.
Meanwhile, the LP presidential candidate blamed unnamed government officials for the country’s failure to meet crude oil sale quota at the international market.
“Nigeria is not able to reach the foreign quota of oil sales in the international market because the people in government are enabling the oil theft going on in Nigeria.”
And to tackle the perennial power outage, Obi promised to revive the sector within the first four years in power.
“Within four years in office, we will be able to distribute 20,000 megawatts of electricity to Nigerians, or even more,” he said, stressing that education will be invested in given its relationship with development.
“Education is an investment because the more your people are educated, the more you will see development. Health, Education, and pulling people out of poverty will take top priority in my government,” he added.
Source: The Punch
