The gubernatorial candidate of People’s Redemption Party (PRP), Malam Hayatudeen Makarfi, has promised to make Kaduna state the food basket of the world, ICT hub of Africa and economic hub of Nigeria, if elected come March 2023.
Addressing the Let’s Talk Nigeria series organised by the Kaduna League of Veteran Journalists at the Arewa House Kaduna on Thursday, the PRP guber candidate, who lamented the huge level of indebtedness of the state, said the party’s three point agenda of social justice, economic, and human capital development, aimed at taking the state out of the woods, adding that Kaduna state has yet to achieve it’s potential.
“PRP planned and foresee a future for Kaduna state with equitable opportunity for all. We want to make Kaduna state the economic hub of Nigeria, the ICT hub of Africa and the food basket of the world. Our number one mission is to unite Kaduna. Kaduna has not been more divided than it is today either by religion or ethnicity. Graduates are unemployed in their thousands, there is drug abuse. You have over 70% of the population full of energy, angry because they feel their future has been mortgaged
“Our three point agenda are social justice, economic and human capital development. We want a government that is people centered, that everybody takes ownership of, we want to do in four years what is achievable in 16 years. We want an equitable environment where everybody has that sense of belonging that the injustice perpetrated over the years will be addressed to ensure that there is justice. A land system that is equitable to all.
“We have found ourselves in a Kaduna that we never envisioned. Kaduna state today is the second most indebted state in Nigeria after Lagos. Our revenue is N25 billion on paper, we are supposed to pay N35 billion debt annually. Teachers are forced to retire without paying their entitlement, markets are demolished without any alternative, commercial activities are taken to almost zero. The standard of education is where it is, the standard of healthcare is where it is.
“We want autonomy of the judiciary, the house of assembly and the local government. A decentralized system that work for everybody that addresses the rural-urban migration. We want to go back to the politics of ideology. We want to move the economy from consumption to production to have made in Kaduna goods and services, investments in SMEs, investments in youth creativity, empower our informal sector to be more effective and export their services. That is the only way to pay the debt abd guarantee development.
“We want to bring our textile industry back, revive the industries built by PRP over 40 years ago, Kachia gingers, Zaria injection, Ikara tomatoes. We want to build need based industry, every year one industry per local government. We want to localize production of particular goods in different parts of the state to have value chain created across the 23 local government areas, agriculture, science and technology. We want to train young students in skills between JSS2 to SS3 that they would be proficient in and they would be certified by NBTE,” Makarfi said.
