APC: North Central Losing Billions to Dearth of Development Agenda

APC: North Central Losing Billions to Dearth of Development Agenda

Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja

The All Progressives Congress (APC), North-central, has lamented that the geo-political zone is losing billions of naira to lack of economic development agenda.

The APC called on governors, lawmakers, ministers and party leaders from the zone to pull more together through strategic engagement in polices and programmes that would benefit the people in the zone.

The APC National Vice Chairman, Alhaji Sulaiman Wambai made the call saturday in Abuja during the North Central Zonal Meeting/Mini convention, where the position of the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Mallam Lanre Issa-Onilu was also ratified

At the meeting, Wambai said the global economic development “shows clearly that the immediate future of Nigeria lies more in what the zone has than oil in the South-south which the country presently depends on.”

He noted that the collective attention of the zone should be drawn by this fact and what the zone could achieve together, adding that the zone was due for an economic summit.

Wambai said: “While it is true that we rely mainly on oil from the South-south geo-political zone for national revenue, no one can deny the fact that the North Central remains the food basket of the nation.

“There are a lot our states can do and achieve together if we work closely to take advantage of our resources. We can gain a lot economically if we use our location to our collective advantage.

“Each of our states in the zone has better and bigger arable land than Kebbi state. It is a surprise that billions of Nigeria money is being deployed to Kebbi state through the Central Bank of Nigeria’s anchor borrower programme for agriculture and for rice production.

“Our zone should naturally attract these billions with the land we have to grow rice. Our state government can take full economic advantage of this through collective bargaining.

“We lose huge revenue that could come from our location because we currently do not have a North Central Agenda for Economic Development. We are due for an economic summit in the zone. We urge our governors to look into it.”

He, however, said the zone “is the most politically stable to the ruling party compared to other zones. If we want to mitigate the full contribution of our zone to be equitable with our reward, we need to have a better and more improved synergy with our legislatures, governors, as well as the party.”

“By doing so, we would take full advantage of the national policy by getting better Ministries, agencies and parastatals,” the APC zonal leader said.

While acknowledging Lafia, Nasarawa state capital as the headquarters of the APC North Central zone, Wambai proposed that for administrative convenience, an office be cited in Abuja for Secretariat work meetings.

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