Presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), Rabiu Kwankwaso has said that education and job creation would be his priority if elected president.
Kwankwaso stated this on Saturday in Kaduna while flagging off the North- West zone Presidential campaign.
He said the NNPP blue print is the best for Nigeria as it seeks to address the challenges facing the country.
He said if elected, his administration will build at least 500,000 classrooms to address the problem of the over 20 million out of school children in the country.
He also promised to stop the payments for WAEC, NECO and JAMB forms as well as sell of application forms for admission to any tertiary institution in the country.
This according to him, is to ensure that the children of the less privileged have access to education at all levels.
Kwankwaso said, “Our blue print is the best for Nigeria. There is no time to enumerate everything because it is a 122 page document.
“But there are some critical areas, especially the area of education were we have decided that we will cancel payments for any form either for WAEC or NECO or JAMB or application to any institution in this country.
“The idea is to allow the sons and daughters of the poor to go to the highest level in education. The son of the poor under our government will reach his maximum potential in this country .
“At the primary level we are going to build at least 500,000 classrooms for the out of school children who are today over 20 million.
“Under our arrangement we will do whatever it takes to ensure that education is given a priority.”
He added that being poor should not stop any child from going to school.
The NNPP Presidential candidate lamented the increasing rate of drug abuse, especially, among the youths, promising that he will create jobs to engage them.
“We will create job opportunities to stop this madness of taking drugs. Our young men and women today unfortunately are taking too much drugs and that got to stop. That is what we have done in Kano”, he said.
He added that reformatory centres would be created across the country to rehabilitate drug addicts.
He said, “Those who get themselves involved in drugs, we will take them there to ensure they come out as normal people.
“We will create job opportunities for them. Those who should go to school must go to school…” .
He said he had gone round the country to interact with Nigerians about the dilapidated infrastructure across the country.
“We have gone round the country to ensure that we see our people, to ensure that we take records of the dilapidated infrastructure.
“We will make sure we listen to our people to tell us which is important that our government should do when we are sworn in,” Kwankwaso said.
He also lamented the low turn out at the rally, noting that many people could not travel to Kaduna because tanker drivers association blocked the road connecting the northwest states over issues that made them angry and expressed the hope that the issues would be resolved to allow people travel.
By John Shiklam in Kaduna
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