Stop agonising, do something, Fayemi tells youths, cautions clerics against extremism

By Olayinka Latona

Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State has urged Nigerian youths to take advantage of their numerical strength and voting power to determine who leads at different levels of government in the country.

Fayemi, who disclosed that the youths constitute about 70 per cent of the country’s population, said they need not agonise but rather organise, join the political process from the ward level up to the national level and effect the needed change.

This, he said was more strategic than seeking a regime change through the back door or giving up in frustration and cursing elected representatives on social media platforms.

Fayemi spoke in Lagos, yesterday, at the 2021 edition of The Platform, an annual event hosted by Pastor Poju Oyemade of the Covenant Christian Centre.

Fayemi said, “What I am saying in essence is that we have a duty of mentorship to younger people to say to them that sometimes, you don’t always get what you push for but that not necessarily mean that is the end of the road, you keep knocking on the door, banging it and inevitably, it will open. How long it will open for will depend on your capacity to organise.

“At the risk of sounding immodest, that’s what got some of us into politics. We believe that another Nigeria is possible, a better Nigeria is possible and we should not stand by the sidelines in pushing for that Nigeria of our dreams, we are not there yet but that does not mean we will give up.”

The Chairman, Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) also spoke on the security situation in the country, stressing that everyone was living in fear over the security situation. He added that though progress had been made in the country’s counter-insurgency moves, government at the centre can do much    better to secure lives and properties.

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He further noted that the Buhari government and the APC were committed to ensuring the safety of lives and properties of Nigerians.

Earlier while delivering the keynote address at the 2021 Pre-Synod Nehemeah Summit organised by the Diocese of Lagos, Anglican Communion, Fayemi urged the Federal Government to adopt multi-level policy system to secure the country.

Summit theme was ‘Towards a Safe & Secure Nigeria’.

The governor identified poverty, unemployment and arms proliferation as some of the factors contributing to insecurity and crime in the country.

He said insecurity in Nigeria was multi-faceted, adding that the establishment of state police would address the challenge.

His words: “There is unemployment, drug, climate change and other factors fueling violence extremism. People are innately not criminal, there are sometimes sociological underpinning responsible for the criminality but we take it sequentially and stem the tide of this violence.”

Vanguard News Nigeria

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