Nigerians who are eligible to vote by way of having attained voting age or acquired their permanent voters cards (PVCs) have been told to use the PVCs wisely as the country warms up for its forthcoming general elections.
Babatunde Fashola, Nigeria’s minister for power, works and housing, who gave the advice, also told the people to go out and vote according to the dictates of their conscience and vote for the party that has done something that impacts on their lives positively.
Nigeria and its citizens will be going to the polls to elect their president and members of the national assembly on February 16. So many Nigerians have offered themselves to serve as president but the contest seems to be between the incumbent president, Muhammadu Buhari, and the main opposition part, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) whose flag bearer is former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
Each of the two candidates is formidable in his own right, but Fashola woos the electorate to vote the incumbent president who is of the All Progressives Congress (APC) which rose into power in 2015 through a well oiled electioneering campaign machine and a change mantra that swayed votes to them.
The minister insisted that the government has done well enough in the last four years to deserve a return to power a second time, pointing out that “the coming election is about your future; get your PVC and vote according to your conscience”.
He explained that he was in Lagos to sensitise the people about the election in the hope that each of those who were there was an influencer who could discuss the election with his neighbours, family and friends, church members, peer groups, etc and let them see why they should go out and vote.
“You now enjoy electricity and drive on smoother roads such as Herbert Macaulay, Third Mainland Bridge, Costain, Western Avenue, Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, etc. Your generators have been taken away and replaced with cleaner energy; that tells you that government is working”, he said.
He added that the federal government was constructing roads in every state of the federation just as they were building rail tracks to ensure that trucks that are presently carrying containers would no longer be seen on the roads.
The minister drew attention of the people to the new voting process, explaining that this time, unlike before, voting would follow immediately after accreditation. In the old order, people would come, do their accreditation, go back home and return to do the voting proper at a given time.
Fashola told the youths, who complained of not getting the attention of the federal government in terms of jobs and scholarships, that government was no longer giving direct jobs to the youth, but rather creating the right environment for the private sector to operate optimally and create jobs.
“Our duty is to support business to function by providing power and other infrastructure so that cost of production can come down and demand can increase to enable industries to create jobs”, he disclosed.
Continuing, he said, “the most important thing now is for the youth to identify where there are opportunities to earn income instead of waiting for the government; the traditional jobs are changing and people who need jobs have to realize this; the youth should think of technology and the limitless opportunities it can offer”.
CHUKA UROKO
