As the 2019 Presidential election draws nearer, the Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, on Monday, commended former Vice President of Nigeria, Atiku Abubakar for honouring its invitation for an interactive session.
Atiku, Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the 2019 Presidential election, was at the Ecumenical Centre in Abuja, on Monday night, for a two-hour interactive session with members of CAN who wanted to know how he would govern Nigeria if he wins the 2019 Presidential election.
Speaking during the interactive session, the Methodist Bishop of Ikeja Diocese and CAN Director of Mobilisation and National Issues, Bishop Stephen Adegbite, gave Atiku kudos for being the first presidential candidate to honour its invitation for an interactive session to unfold their plans of governance if elected come 2019.
“You have made history today by being the first presidential candidate to honour our invitation and we do not take it for granted,” Adegbite said.
Adegbite also observed that Atiku, who up for the two hours duration the programme lasted and convincingly addressed all the fears, issues and concerns raised by members of CAN, said that is an indication of his physical fitness.
Atiku who highlighted how his government will improve power supply, increase the number of women and youth in governance, how the challenge of high maternal mortality rate will be addressed, how to grow the economy, put a check on insecurity and how he would stop nepotism in governance also answered question concerning whether he was under any influence by foreign concerns to do their bidding,
On power supply, Atiku said he would adopt the “captive power strategy” where specific power stations would provide power supply for specific areas adding that the strategy would ensure availability of power supply across the country within his first two years in office.
He said that a study has revealed that the adoption of captive power stations will yield greater results than reliance on gas to generate power.
On growing insecurity in the country, he said that the incident would be stemmed by providing jobs for the teeming youths who were idle and willing to be used as instruments of destruction.
According to him, instead of the present administration providing three million jobs yearly as it promised, a total of 11 million jobs have been lost since President Muhammadu Buhari came into office in 2015.
He listed the retooling of the nation’s armed forces for better performance among other strategies that have been pencilled down as means of improving the effective security network of the nation.
Atiku further pledged that he would create the right environment that would attract foreign and local investors who ran away from the country due to harsh economic and investment climate.
He observed that the private sector and not government should be the highest employer of labour and the main engine of economic growth noting that Nigeria slipped into recession because of capital flight and attendant closure of companies in the country following government’s pronouncements which sent the wrong signals to investors.
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He also said that the clampdown on domiciliary accounts forced investors to massively withdraw, close accounts and move their funds elsewhere, adding that the impact of the capital flight was the closure of companies and loss of jobs.
The presidential hopeful also said that 40 per cent of his cabinet would be made of youths, 35 per cent for women while the remaining 25 percent would be filled by older Nigerians, adding that he plans to hand over to a younger generation.
He promised to run an all-inclusive government devoid of any kind of cabal adding that his administration will reduce Nigeria’s high maternal mortality rate by promoting healthcare delivery system that is comprehensive, efficient and can deliver effective and qualitative services to women.
