A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Ambassador Yahaya Kwande, has stated that the incoming administration of General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), cannot afford to disappoint the youths given the support they accorded the party at the national and state elections.
He stressed that the greatest challenge to be faced by the Buhari administration when sworn-in on May 29 would be job creation for teeming Nigerian youths.
Kwande, who made this assertion while speaking with some reporters in Jos, the Plateau State capital yesterday, said, “We have been challenged by Nigerians and must accept the challenge. Thousands of young men had converged here to celebrate the victory. When I saw them, I nearly shed tears. These youths are from 10 to 17 years who are jobless and are jubilating that change has come. I hope we shall not disappoint this group of people. We need to start training them and fitting them into jobs. There is a challenge before us”.
Noting that the debt profile that may be left by the outgoing administration in states like Plateau should not be a hindrance as it does not matter, Mr. Kwande called on government to do its best with the available resources, adding that “it (government) cannot let it wait. If we leave it, it will degenerate further.
“One of the efforts the Plateau state government for instance can make, is to align with the federal government and it will come to its rescue”.
On the level of development on the Plateau, the APC chieftain said it will be wrong to say the state has not been able to make any headway, saying, “We will not say Plateau has been static. It has made some progress but being among the first generation states, you cannot compare its developmental stride with the second or even the third generation states”.
The elder statesman blamed the problem on past administrations, which he said did not move Plateau at the same pace with those he called “progressives states”.
“We have not been lucky on the Plateau with past administrations in moving along with the progressive states. If there is anything that any government could have done at the least, it should have been to develop its tourism potentials which we are so proud of”, he said.