"
2023 Presidential election: Nigerians should vote for experience Candidate - Atiku
----says he will create an enabling environment for foreign and local investors
The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar has pointed out the kind of leader Nigerians should vote for in 2023.
Atiku said Nigerians should look out for an experienced leader.
He spoke at Monday’s 62nd conference of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, in Lagos.
“I believe we have had an experience and that experience must be brought back,” he said.
Atiku said since the emergence of the current administration, the country has recorded “all the negative indices. Today we are more disunited.”
He said the level of insecurity and poverty has risen in measures never been seen.
The PDP presidential candidate said any candidate that emerges as the president must confront some key areas.
He explained that unity, economy, security, and devolution of power must be confronted.
According to the former vice-president, one of his proposed reforms is to create an enabling environment for foreign and local investors.
Abubakar said the reform will include healthcare and education because the government alone cannot bring about development.
“One of the fundamental reforms I have in my policy document is to encourage the private sector as far as the development of the country is concerned — both foreign and local. It is very essential because the federal government does not have the resources to do all the things that they want to do,” he said.
“The only way is to make sure that a conducive environment is available for the local and foreign investors to participate in the development of our country, whether it is infrastructure, education and healthcare.
“I had an argument with a university professor from Federal University, Lokoja. He said he read in my policy document that I intend to devolve, in other words, to return education to the states. How dare I do that?
“I said: ‘Mr professor, do you realise that the first set of our universities belongs to the regional governments?’ He said, ‘yes’. I said ‘who are the successors of the regional government?’ He said: ‘the states’.
“I said the children you send to America or England, who own those universities? Mostly the private sector. So, why is it that you think we cannot do it here? We don’t have the money.”
The nation’s public universities have been shut since February due to the strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU).
Stakeholders have accused the federal government of being insensitive to the plight of students and not prioritising the demands of ASUU.