Ayodele Olalere
Mr. Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the forthcoming 2023 presidential election, on Monday, urged Nigerians, especially youths, to vote for a competent leader who has the capacity and character to provide solutions to Nigeria’s problems.
Obi spoke at the Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, held at Eko Hotel and Suites, Victoria Island, Lagos.
According to him, the high rate of unemployment among youths is alarming, adding that 60% of the youths ought to be gainfully employed but the opposite is the case.
He warned that should the people fail to take leadership seriously, Nigeria might be faced with more challenges that are currently bedeviling it.
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“Out of 200 million Nigerians, 60 per cent are supposed to be working. So we are supposed to have 120 million Nigerians working but today, Nigerians that are working are under 60 million.
“So over 70 million Nigerians are not working, they are not productive and when you compare this to your productivity, you will see how low it is, ” he lamented.
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He added: ” But what is even worse is that we are in a fiscal mess, a total fiscal mess because of all these. Between January this year and April the total revenue of the Federal Government of Nigeria is N1.630 trillion, and the expenditure is N4.72 trillion. If you minus this, we have a deficit of about N3.1 trillion and that shows that almost 200 per cent is a deficit.”
Obi said the 2023 election offers Nigerians the opportunity to vote competent people into key positions in the country.
“Next year, the election we are going to have next year would not be about tribes, religion, not connections, not entitlements but must be about character, competence, capacity and solution providers,” he said.
