Rep urges Buhari to declare emergency in agric sector …says youth unemployment a time bomb
By; Oladele Adedayo, Ado-Ekiti.
The Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Youth Development, Hon. Segun Adekola has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to declare emergency in agriculture sector to diversify the economy and bring Nigeria out of the current economic doldrums occasioned by the slumping of oil price in the international market.
Adekola, a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) representing Ekiti South Federal constituency I in the National Assembly also posited that the N6.08 trillion budgetary proposal presented by President Buhari would be difficult to fund, saying the dwindling oil revenue cannot sustain this staggering amount.
Speaking in Ikere-Ekiti on Monday during an empowerment programme for 500 people in his constituency and flagging off of a skills acquisition programme, the lawmaker described youth unemployment as a time bomb waiting to explode.
“The President can even bring back programmes like Green Revolution, Operation Feed the Nation and many other agric programmes to just bail us out of this economic quagmire and sole dependence on oil as means of survival”.
Adekola, at the event where he distributed Sewing Machine, Grinding Machine, Generating set worth millions of naira, said the empowerment became imperative as a fulfillment of his electioneering campaign and way to reduce unemployment ravaging every stratum of the country.
Adekola lamented that “Dunlop and Odutola tyre making industries and many others have relocated to Ghana and South Africa because of
epileptic power supply.
“President Buhari must face issue of electricity supply with practical approach. One cannot imagine the losses we have suffered and millions of employment we have lost through the relocation of these industries.
“It was Agriculture that Chief Obafemi Awolowo used to develop the Southwest, so we have to go back to it if Buhari is very determined to achieve his focus.
“I know FG is putting up efforts to redirect our economy, but they need to take more practical and feasible steps”.
