The presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) Omoyele Sowore says his government will prioritise education and will make it free at all levels if he comes to power.
Sowore made the comment while fielding questions on Channels Televisionโs Sunday Politics.
Free education is one of the key promises in his partyโs manifesto. When asked to explain further about the plan, he said it is for โevery level. The money is there. I keep saying this to Nigerians and I say it with that knowledge of how they manage Nigeriaโs economyโ.
He claimed that the money siphoned from the countryโs coffers in the past 16 years is โenough to have supported free education in this country or to have supported it for 50 years or 100 years ahead of nowโ.
According to him, when compared with other oil-producing, particularly the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Nigeria is lagging behind.
โThey provide free education for everybody. They even pay people to get married and we all started with the same oil that we are selling,โ the activist-turned-politician said.
โBut what we have been doing in Nigeria is corporate welfare and individual powerful people welfare.โ
As part of his plans for Nigeria, he also promised to decentralise the power sector if elected, saying the plan will generate about 24,000 megawatts of electricity in four years.
โWith 24, 000 megawatts of electricity in four years, you would be creating nothing less than one to four million jobs,โ Sowore explained.
โThe private sector taking it over with stolen money is not working,โ the 51-year-old said, claiming that โthe privatisation thing is a scam. It is still Nigeriaโs money stolen by them. โ
Away from the power sector, Sowore claimed the 1999 Constitution of the country is โfraudulentโ, pinning most of Nigeriaโs challenges on it.
โIf you are going to vote for me, you are voting for that promise to change the fraudulent constitution,โ the publisher added.