Building on his promise to engage citizens and voters across the country on policies and ideas to build Nigeria, presidential candidate and founder, Institute for Governance and Economic Transformation, Professor Kingsley Moghalu held a town hall meeting with residents of Abeokuta, Ogun, yesterday, April 24, 2018.
Themed ‘The Role of Women and Youth in Governance’, the event was held at the NUJ Hall, Iwe Iroyin House. It was attended by traditional rulers, women leaders, student activists, among others.
Emphasizing the need to drastically reduce poverty and create employment for youths in the country to avert dissatisfaction and conflict in Nigeria, the candidate called for urgent and effective policies to promote entrepreneurship, innovation and support small businesses. He later promised to address unemployment prevalent among Nigerian youth when he emerges as president.
“Our population currently stands at about 200 million with unemployment rising from 8.2 percent in 2015 to 18.8 percent. Nigeria currently stands as the poverty capital of the world, with 152 million Nigerians – about 80 percent of our citizens – meet the criteria of absolute poverty. When you think about the statistics and apply this to the economy, we cannot continue this way,” he said.
The former deputy governor of Central Bank of Nigeria stated that zoning of political posts among Nigerian leaders has not led to national development. He later explained that 2019 elections have been zoned to competence as it provides an opportunity for citizens to elect technocrats with experience in solving practical economic problems and actively unite the nation.
The candidate also shared his mission to revamp the Nigerian power sector by investing in renewable energy for individual use while focusing the large hydropower and gas plants on providing consistent power for industries and businesses. According to him, this would drastically cut the costs of operating businesses in Nigeria thereby reducing the price of goods and massively boost the economy.
During the tour, Professor Kingsley Moghalu also paid a courtesy visit to the Alake of Egbaland, Oba Adedotun Aremu Gbadebo III at his palace in Abeokuta, where he promised to embrace words of wisdom from the traditional ruler for a new, bold, different approach to Nigeria.
