Kingsley Moghalu has declared his intention to vie for the post of Nigeria’s president in 2023, saying that his decision was born out of the need to serve and rescue the country.
He, however, did not say which political party he would be contesting, but promised to announce it in the next few months.
Moghalu, who is a professor, was the candidate of the Young Progressives Party (YPP), in the 2019 presidential election.
In a statement Tuesday, he said his decision to contest was informed by the need to salvage the country from impending collapse, promising that his administration would prioritise poverty reduction, security, education, while delivering good governance in an agenda he titled ‘SWAG’.
He canvassed for the support of all segments of the population for his ambition, while warning that the country must urgently carry out constitutional restructuring, while the National Assembly must pass the Electoral Act for Nigerians to feel the impact of democracy.
Moghalu bemoaned the deplorable state of infrastructure across the country, stressing that the country was in need of a visionary leader to reposition it, promising to run an inclusive administration made of competent Nigerians from all sections of the country.
He charged Nigerians to rise, participate in the electoral process, and take back their country from the grip of the few elite, who are out to foster their agenda, while the country retrogress among its peers.
Moghalu is a former deputy governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) from 2009-2014; and the founder and president of the Institute for Governance and Economic Transformation (IGET), a think- tank body based in Abuja.
He is a political economist, lawyer, and former United Nations official. He taught at Tufts University as Professor of Practice in International Business and Public Policy at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy from 2015 to 2017.
He is a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Council on Emerging Market Enterprises at the Fletcher School at Tufts University and is the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Special Envoy on post-Covid Development Finance for Africa.
Moghalu is a member of the Advisory Council of the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum (OMFIF)
His full statement reads, “What is the value of a Nigerian life? We live daily today in the shadow of terrorists. Our economy is collapsing. Many families cannot afford the price of food. Millions of young men and women have no jobs and have no hope. Our university students know more about ASUU strikes and long school closures than any skills they need to be competitive in the world of the 21st century.
“Only the rich and powerful can access quality healthcare in our country or abroad as medical tourists, because our health system, like most other systems, is broken. I lost my father, Isaac Moghalu, in December 1998 because he had a stroke but the doctors were on strike, and therefore we could not get him adequate healthcare on time. Soon after we found a private clinic and moved him there, he went into a coma and passed on shortly afterwards. I was heartbroken.
“Today, 23 years later, not much has changed. Like many, I have suffered personally the effects of bad governance in our country. With life in it increasingly nasty, brutish and short, the very idea of Nigeria is now almost meaningless to many Nigerians. Cries for self-determination fill the air in response to fundamental injustice. Meanwhile, politics in Nigeria does not bring change, and its benefits go to only one group: the political elite. Their message is loud and clear: we the people you and I- do not matter.
“The bodies of Nigerians are buried in cold corners of foreign cemeteries, strewn across the Sahara desert, and float in the Mediterranean Sea as a consequence of a non-existent leadership. Our country can no longer speak confidently in the gathering of nations. Life as ordained by our creator, that we may experience His Goodness in this land of the living, has eluded us as a people.
“Only the emergence of visionary, competent and inclusive national leadership, on the one hand, and a fundamental restructuring of Nigeria based on a new people’s constitution, on the other, can arrest Nigeria’s on-going disorderly and violent degeneration into a completely failed state. We were not born to be miserable and to die miserable.
“Enough is enough! It is now more than ever necessary that we elect in 2023 a leader who is TRULY committed and has the capacity to initiate the constitutional restructuring of Nigeria. A leader who is competent to secure our lives and property, successfully manage our diversity, save our economy, and restore our international respect. For the sake of the youth of our country including my four children whose future is being drowned in reckless foreign borrowing, and for the sake of all Nigerians suffering and seeking a clear alternative to the status quo, I intend, with all humility, to present myself again as a candidate for the Office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the 2023 general elections.
“If elected, I will run a government with a dream team of highly competent Nigerians from all parts of our country. Along with strengthened, independent institutions, we will deliver results on a 4- point agenda in four years (4 by 4):
• Security for all Nigerians and Nigeria’s territory
• War against poverty: skills, jobs for our youth, and an innovation economy
• Accelerated education and healthcare reform
• Good Governance: Inclusive, transparent, effective and accountable.
“This is my SWAG Agenda for 21st century Nigeria. I seek the support of all compatriots of everyone who is tired of our present national situation. We also need the energy and support of the youth, the middle class, entrepreneurs, and our compatriots in the diaspora. These important segments of our population have in the past been reluctant to engage actively in our electoral process, ostensibly because of the flaws in that process.
“The National Assembly must now pass into law, with no further delay, necessary electoral reforms that will make democracy yield real dividends for Nigerians. Our votes must count and be counted transparently. The amendments should include a provision for Diaspora Nigerians to be able to register and vote in all elections in Nigeria from abroad. I am only one face of a movement.
“A movement of silent and suffering Nigerians fed up with the insecurity, poverty, and a seemingly hopeless future for our country. A movement that has decided that enough is enough. That movement, soon to be present in our numbers in every voting ward in Nigeria, will announce within the next few months the political party we will join en masse and seek its platform for the presidential, legislative and gubernatorial roles in governance.
“We can do this. We can change Nigeria. Together, let us walk this road to a Nigeria that, within 30 years of successive administrations, will have achieved the kind of economic and technological advancement attained by countries such as Israel, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates within similar timeframes. It is possible. We only need to participate actively in the democratic process and vote right when the time comes. We the Nigerian people matter. We the Nigerian people deserve better. Let’s do this. Because we can and we must”.
