…Set To Dislodge Opposition Parties, Capture Edo, Anambra, Other South Eastern States
ABUJA (FCT, Nigeria) — The National Chairman, All Progressives Congress, APC, Dr. Abdullahi Ganduje said the party has introduced an intellectual wing, Progressive Institute to set agenda and offer solutions to the challenges bedeviling the country.
Ganduje made this known while speaking with members of the Kano Correspondent Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, (NUJ) in his office.
The National Chairman also vowed that the party is battle ready to dislodge the opposition parties in Edo and Anambra States in the forthcoming elections while strategizing ahead to capture the South Eastern states. To
He stressed the intellectual wing were to pick up on national issues begging for attention, analyze it and proffer solutions to help the government find a lasting solutions to such issue.
According to him, “We establish what we called an intellectual wing for the party, progressives institute. It is to analyse national issues so that they can get the attention of the government to become an agenda for the government.
“If you could recall, at one time, we even organised a national conference for livestock reform after the incessant farmers and herders clash. Like we said, the relationship between farmers and herders many years ago was a symbiotic relationship where farmers get the benefit of manure from the livestock while herders get grazing areas from the farmers. But with the coming into advent of fertilizer, the farmer doesn’t require much of the manure of the cow while the cow still requires the services for grazing. So with the growing population, you find out the grazing areas have been reduced and that creates a serious problem. So we organise a national conference that has led to the creation of the ministry of livestock which will soon be inaugurated by the president. And we hope we will kill so many birds with one stone.
“First of all, we reduce the issue of conflict and security issue. Secondly, we modernise the issue of livestock production which is a new phenomenon and thirdly, the education of the herdsmen which will be for national development.
“Now, we have recently observed that the level of unemployment is going high in the country especially youth unemployment and we are organising a national conference to that effect. And we will soon know how we can modernise or reform our national curriculum even including University curriculum so that the graduates we will produce will be employable graduates not unemployable graduates like we are having now,” he said.
On the forthcoming elections in Edo, Ondo and Anambra States, Ganduje said, “Let’s start with Edo, which is coming on the 21st September, 2024. I believe our campaign is with high spirit, we are getting ready for that election and we believe we will be able to recover our state because it was an APC state but because of Internal squabbles we lost it to PDP. But we are sure we will recover that state.
“For Ondo state, it’s already an APC state and when the former governor died, a number of problems came up on who succeeds him but we were able to resolve those issues. We conducted primaries, we succeeded in getting the person that they want.
“We are also getting ready for that election which is coming up in November. If we win Edo we will be getting an additional state for the party. It will be 21 states out of 36.
“Next year, there will be election in Anambra which has been a state governed by APGA for many years but we have introduced a new scheme. The South East political zone are all claiming that they have been marginalised but what we are telling them is that those marginalisation have been created by them. How can you have five states and ruled by four political parties. What will be your political bargain? So we have introduced a new phenomenon which we call the political marginalisation of the southeast geopolitical zone where we are working very hard to ensure that we get more states from that zone and we want to start with Anambra.
“Already we have Ebonyi, Imo states, now we are encroaching into that zone to ensure that we capture most of the states. And if we get what we want we capture all the states,” Ganduje said.
The National Chairman however, hinted on plans by the party to introduce e-registration of members of the party, internal democracy in the party, changing narrative of the party from only active during electioneering year to all year round and also preparations ahead of the National Executive Council, NEC meeting of the party.
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