World Population Day: Challenges of Leadership Failure Have Kept Nigerian Youthful Population Unproductive, Says Obi
The Presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election, Mr. Peter Obi has disclosed that the challenges of leadership failure have left Nigerian youthful population ineffective.
Mr. Obi opined that Nigeria will experience quantum leap with proper investment in human development.
He made this known on Thursday in commemoration of this year’s World Population Day themed “Leave no one behind, count everyone”.
“Today, we join the global community in commemorating World Population Day. It is a day that reminds us all of the need to address very germane issues of harnessing our population to engender development in the nation.
“As the most populous country in Africa and the 6th most populous country in the world, Nigeria remains blessed in human resources, which when fully explored through investments in the 3 most critical areas of human development: health, education and fighting poverty, the country will experience tremendous transformation and development.
“In Nigeria today, with more than half of the population falling within the productive age bracket of 15 to 64 years, we are reported to have the highest youth population in the world.
“However, challenges of leadership failure have continued to keep our teeming youthful population unproductive, thereby slowing our journey from consumption to production,” Obi said.
He ascribed the ‘failure’ to the leaders not showing commitment to investing in health, education and supporting Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), poverty, crime, unemployment and inflation.
The former Anambra State Governor emphasised that the factors have all remained on the increase; while life expectancy, literacy rate, and per capita income have remained on the decrease.
He stressed that the celebration provides Nigeria with the opportunity to review its population issues about development and see how to leverage its huge population, especially the youths, to drive development across the nation.
“This we can do by prioritizing their health, and education and supporting their small businesses. By so doing, we will not just have a huge population, but we will take pride in our productive population contributing, in many ways, to the development of the nation,” he added.
