After
three years in government, opinions are sharply divided as to how well the APC
government has fared. While a section of the Nigerian voters is arguing that
going by the current situation in the country the APC deserves no merit to earn
their votes, some are of the belief that the government has indeed made very ambitious
progress and should be given another chance.
We
thought that as part of our media responsibilities in sensitizing our esteemed
readers, there should be need to revisit the campaign promises made by
President Muhammadu Buhari, then known as General Muhammadu Buhari (retd) to
afford everyone the opportunity to personally appraise his government and decide
whether those promises have indeed been fulfilled or are being fulfilled.
I, Muhammadu Buhari,
believe that our politics is broken. Our nation urgently needs fundamental
political reform and improvement in governance more transparency and
accountable. If you nominate me in December, 2014 and elect me in February
2015, my administration will:
1. Initiate action to
amend the Nigerian Constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties, and
responsibilities to states in order to entrench true Federalism and the Federal
spirit;
2. Strengthen INEC to
reduce, if possible, eliminate electoral malpractices in Nigerian’s political
life;
3. Attract the best and
brightest of our sons and daughters into our politics and public service by
aggressive recruitment of private sector people, academics, and professionals
within
Nigeria and in the
Diaspora through internships, fellowships, executive appointments, and special
nomination to contest elective offices;
4. Prevent the abuse and
misuse of Executive, Legislative and Public offices, through greater
accountability, transparency, strict, and implementable anti-corruption laws,
through strengthening and sanitising the EFCC and ICPC as independent entities;
5. Amend the Constitution
to remove immunity from prosecution for elected officers in criminal cases;
6. Restructure governance
for a leaner, more efficient, and adequately compensated public service sector,
while promoting effective participation of the private sector for more robust
job creation programmes to employ the teaming youth.;
7. Require full disclosure
in media outlets, of all government contracts over N100m prior to award and during
implementation at regular intervals;
8. Reform and Strengthen
the Justice System for efficient administration and dispensation of justice
with the creation of special courts for accelerated hearing of corruption, drug
trafficking, terrorism and similar cases of national importance;
9. Fully enforce the
Freedom of Information Act l so that government held data sets can be requested
and used by the public and then such data sets be publish on regular basis;
10. Amend the Constitution
to require Local governments to publish their meeting minutes, service
performance data, and items of spending over N10M.
SECURITY AND CONFLICT
RESOLUTION
ON NATIONAL SECURITY AND
DEFENCE:
I will urgently secure the
territorial integrity of the nation. I will never leave the defence of the
nation in the hands of Hunters, Children, and Civilian JTF through the
following:
1. Urgently address
capacity building mechanisms of law enforcement agents in terms of quantity and
quality as this is critical in safeguarding the sanctity of lives and property;
2. Establish a well
trained, adequately equipped and goals driven Serious Crime Squad to combat
insurgencies, kidnapping, armed robbery, ethno-religious and communal clashes,
nationwide;
3. Consult and amend the
Constitution to enable States and Local Governments to create city, Local
government and State Policing systems, base on the resources available at each
levels, to address the peculiar needs of each community. I will therefore work
with the National Assembly to set and revised, when needed, boundaries of
operations, for Federal, State, and Local government policing units, through
new Criminal Justice legislation to replace the Criminal Code, the Penal Code
and the Police Act.
4. I will push for more
robust support in the Security and Economic stability of the West-African
sub-region and African Continent as a whole. I will seek and maintain close and
frank relationship with ALL of West Africa; Special relationship with South
Africa and its Sub-region; UK, USA, Canada, EU, Asia, and the Middle East .
ON
CONFLICT RESOLUTION, NATIONAL UNITY, AND SOCIAL HARMONY:
I will;
1. Establish a Conflict
Resolution Commission to help prevent, mitigate, and resolve civil conflicts
within the polity;
2. Bring permanent peace
and solution to the insurgency issues in the North-East; the Niger Delta; and
other conflict prone states and areas such as Plateau, Benue, Bauchi, Borno,
Abia, Taraba, Yobe, and Kaduna in order to engender national unity and social
harmony;
3. Initiate policies to
ensure that Nigerians are free to live and work in any part of the country by
removing state of origin, tribe, ethnic and religious affiliations from
documentation requirements in our identification of citizens and replace these
with State of Residence and fashion out the appropriate minimal qualification
for obtaining such a state of residency, nation-wide.
ON
FOREIGN POLICY:
I will;
1. Make regional
integration a priority within ECOWAS including free trade with a view to
ensuring that common tariff currency are in use by the end of my term in
office, under Nigeria’s guidance and leadership, base on the size of its market
force;
2. Maintain a strong,
close and frank relationship within the Gulf of Guinea, the Commonwealth, South
Africa and the rest of the world.
3. Establish a special
relationship with the leading emerging markets like Brazil; Russia, India and
China (BRIC) and other strategic partners around the world.
THE
ECONOMY & INFRASTRUCTURE BASE ON THE ECONOMY:
I will;
1. Maintain sound Micro
and macro-economic policy environment, and run an efficient government and
preserve the independence of the Central Bank;
2. Restore financial
confidence in the citizens and the world, by putting in place a more robust
monitoring, supervising, and regulating of the financial institutions;
3. Make our economy one of
the fastest growing emerging economies in the world with a real GDP growth
averaging at least 10-12% annually
4. As at 1999, Nigerian
rate of unemployment stood at about 8%, today it is estimated from official
statistics to be close to 30%. I will embark on vocational training,
entrepreneurial and skills acquisition scheme for graduates along with the
creation of Small Business Loan Guarantee Scheme to create at least 5 million
new jobs by 2019. A Small and Medium Enterprises Development Commission will be
created for this purpose. I will also encourage State Governments to focus on
employment creation, by matching everyone job created in the same state.
5. Integrate the informal
economy into the mainstream and prioritize the full implementation of the
National Identification Scheme to generate the relevant data;
6. Expand domestic demand
and will undertake associated public works programmes to achieve this goal;
7. Embark on export and
production diversification including investment in infrastructure; promote
manufacturing, through Agro Based industries; and expand and promote
sub-regional trade through ECOWAS and AU;
8. Make Information
Technology, Manufacturing, Agriculture and Entertainment key drivers of our
economy, by reviewing the present reward system, which is based on
certification, to that based on skills, competencies, and performances;
9. Balance the Nigerian
economy across regions by the creation of 6 Regional Economic Development
Agencies (REDAs) to act as sub-regional hubs in order to promote healthy
regional competitiveness;
Put in place a N300bn
Regional Growth Fund with an average of N50bn in each geo-political region; to
be managed by the REDAs, to encourage private sector enterprise and to support
places currently reliant on only on the public sector, to migrate to a private
sector reality;
AMEND
THE CONSTITUTION AND THE:
10. Land Use Act to create
freehold/leasehold interests in land along with matching grants for states to
create a nationwide electronic land title register on a state by state basis;
11. Create an additional
middle-class of at least 4 million new home owners by 2019 by enacting a
national mortgage single digit interest rates for purchase of owner occupier
houses as well as review the collateral qualification to make funding for home
ownership easier, with a 15 to 30 year mortgage terms. This will equally help
our banking system migrate from short to long term perspective of their role in
sustaining the economy.
12. Create a Social Welfare
Program of at least Five Thousand Naira (N5000) that will cater for the 25
million poorest and most vulnerable citizens upon the demonstration of
children’s enrolment in school and evidence of immunisation to help promote
family stability.
13. Provide allowances to
the discharged but unemployed Youth Corps members for Twelve (12) months while
in the skills and entrepreneurial development programmes.
14. Equate N1.00 to $1.00
ON
AGRICULTURE:
I will;
1. Modernize the sector
and change Nigeria from being a country of self-subsistence farmers to that of
a medium/large scale farming nation/producer;
2. Create a nationwide
food inspectorate division with a view to improving nutrition and eliminating
food-borne hazards
3. Inject sufficient funds
to the Agricultural sector to create more agro-allied jobs by way of loans at
nominal interest rates for capital investment on medium and commercial scale
cash crops;
4. Guarantee a minimum
price for all cash crops and facilitate storage of agricultural products to
overcome seasonal shortages of selected food crops.
5. Move the nation to an
all year round small, medium, and commercial farming through a coordinated
integrative irrigation of our existing dams as well as creation of more dam to
collect the over flooding waters, nationwide.
6. Revive our Agricultural
Research Institutes that are in a state of comatose;
7. Review and strengthened
Veterinary practices nationwide.
ON
INFRASTRUCTURE:
I will;
1. Review the Public
Private Partnership (PPP) enabling environment with a view to addressing the
legal, regulatory and operational bottlenecks, challenging the effective
administration of the system, by introducing enabling legislation. In addition,
I will create a National Infrastructural Development Bank to provide loans at
nominal interest rates, exclusively for this sector;
2. Generate, transmit and
distribute electricity on a 24/7 basis whilst simultaneously ensuring the
development of sustainable/renewable energy, by 2019.
3. Embark on a National
Infrastructural Development Programme as a Public Private Partnership that will
(a) ensure 5,000km of
Superhighway including service trunks and
(b) building of up to
6,800km of modern railway completed by 2019;
4. Enact new legal and
regulatory frameworks to establish independent regulation and incentives to
accelerate public and private sector investment in seaports, railways, and
inland waterways;
5. Embark on PPP schemes
that will ensure every one of the 36 states has one functional airport, with
all 21st Century safety tools for effective commercial air travel.
ON
THE OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY:
I will:
1. Revive and reactivate
our minimally performing Refineries to optimum capacity;
2. Make the industry and
Nigeria one of the world leading/cutting edge centres for clean oil and gas
technology; also producing leading world Oil and Gas technologist, scientists,
and owing mega structure installations, drilling, processing, and production
facilities and engineers. These facilities and scientists will be supported
with the best services and research facilities.
3. Fully develop the
sector’s capacity to absorb more of the nation’s new graduate in the labour
market. The sector will be funded to produce more home-grown, but world class
engineers, scientists, technologist, etc.;
4. Modernise the NNPC and
make it the national energy champion. I will consider breaking it up into more
efficient, commercially driven units; and may strip it of its regulatory
powers, so as to enable it tap into international capital market;
5. Enforce the government
master plan for oil companies to end flaring that pollutes the air and damages
the communities and people’s health and ensure that they sell at least half of
their gas produced within Nigeria;
6. Speedily pass the
much-delayed Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) and ensure that local content issues
are fully addressed
7. Make Nigeria the
world’s leading exporter of LNG through the creation of strategic partnerships.
8. Stabilise oil price
THE
SOCIETY & HUMAN CAPITAL DEVELOPMENT ON EDUCATION:
I will;
1. Fully review provisions
of the Universal Basic Education Act with emphasis on gender equity in primary,
secondary school enrolment whilst improving the quality and substance of our
schools, through outcome based education, that address the individual, family,
and societal roles in education; and the associative skills and competencies
that go with these responsibilities;
2. Targeting up to 20% of
our annual budget for this critical sector whilst making substantial
investments in training quality teachers at all levels of the educational
system;
3. Implement a performance
based education, predicated on outcomes, skills, and competences as against the
current certificate based qualification. I will adjust the reward system
accordingly too. This way, exams malpractice and certificate forgery will be
resolved once and for all. Young men and women interested in real liberal arts
education, based on a true understanding of scientific, the humanistic, and the
social sciences will fill our classrooms to be prepared for future leadership
of the nation;
4. Enhance teacher
training and improve the competence of teachers in the light of the 21st
Century and beyond understanding of the learner types, intelligence types, as
the multiple assessment types, in order to open up learning for all our
children types. The era of one student type will give way to an all learner
type for our children and young people as well as adults who want to return to
the classroom to sharpen their skills, competencies, and sensibilities. This
re-engineering of our education will be followed with a clearly thought out and
vigorous national inspection programmes;
5. Make learning
experiences more meaningful for children as the nation’s education will no
longer be a preparation for life, but life itself. Our children will be
democratised for education, rather than be educated for democracy. This view of
education will make educating our children more cost-effective in the long run;
6. Provide One Meal a day
for all elementary/primary/Almajiri schools That will create jobs in
Agriculture, Catering, and Delivery Services
7. Develop and promote
effective use of innovative teaching methods/materials in our schools;
8. Ensure a greater
proportion of expenditure on university education is devoted to helping our
youth to understand the juxtaposition of Science, Technology, the Humanities
and the Social Sciences.
9. Establish at least six
new universities of Science and Technology with satellite campuses in various
states. These six universities should be fully equipped with ICT technologies
in order to attract and encourage small and medium scale ICT enterprises after
their university education;
10. Establish technical
colleges and vocational centres in each state of the federation;
11. Provide more conducive environment for private sector participation in all levels of education. Re-authorised the NUC, TETFUN, JAMB, etc, Acts to enable Private institutions of Higher learning to benefit from research funds and programmes that will serve the national good;
12. Establish six centres
of excellence to address the needs of special education;
ON
HEALTHCARE:
I will;
1. Prioritise the
reduction of the infant mortality rate substantially; reduce maternal mortality
rates to the levels acceptable by the World Health Organisation; reduce
HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases drastically and improve life expectancy
by an additional 10 years on average through our National Healthy Living
program;
2. Increase the number of
physicians from 19 per 1000 population to 50 per 1000 through deliberate
medication education as epitomize by nations such as Ghana. I will increase
national health expenditure per person per annum to about N50,000 (from the
less than N10,000 currently);
3. Increase the quality of
all federal government owned hospitals to world class standard by 2019;
4. Invest in cutting edge
technology such as tele-medicine in all major health centers in the country
through partnership programmes with communities and the private sector;
5. Provide free ante-natal
care for pregnant women; free health care for babies and children up to school
going age and for the aged; and free treatment for those afflicted with
infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS;
6. Boost the local
manufacture of pharmaceuticals and make non adulterated drugs readily
available. Set an effective prosecution and punishment systems, for those
importing or adulterating drugs in the country.
7. The enhancement of the
Epidemiological Units / Centres for Diseas Control to meet up with Global
standards in containment of disease outbreaks, proper vaccine storage and
research;
8. Create an Insurance
Policy for our Journalists as the nation faces hard times and our Journalists
face more dangers in the discharge of their investigative work, to educate
Nigerians in their rights and responsibilities.
9. Ban medical tourism by
our politicians from May 29, 2015.
ON
YOUTH, SPORTS AND CULTURE:
I will;
1. Provide the
opportunities such as setting up functional recreational facilities, Library
with e-services, Community Centers, in collaboration with States, Local
Government Authorities, Local Development Areas, etc for youth to realize,
harness, and develop their potentials to the fullest, in order to facilitate
the emergence of the new generation of citizens, who will be committed to the
sustenance of good governance and service to the people and the country;
2. Establish Zonal
world-class sports academies and training institutes and ensure that Nigeria
occupies a place of pride in global sports and athletics;
3. Revive and restructure
the Nigerian Football League and put incentives in place to make it as
competitive as other national leagues
4. Put in place measures
to identify talents early and ensure their participation in local and
international games to enable them to be true professionals;
5. Help as well as mandate
schools and communities to create neighborhood playgrounds/sports centre. I
will create matching support funds for communities to acquire the needed
equipment to develop skills and competencies;
6. Assist Nollywood to
fully develop into world class movie industry that can compete effectively with
Hollywood and Bollywood in due course. I will support the creative and
performing arts with the necessary environment where by our great entertainers
do not end their lives in abject poverty as is currently the case.
Source: Vanguard
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