Road to 2023: Atiku woos Edo voters, promises local police

From Joshua Orji

People’s Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate and former vice president Atiku Abubakar has promised to decentralize policing to pave the way for local police if elected president in the 2023 general elections.

Atiku made the promise on Saturday in Benin City, the Edo State capital while speaking at the PDP presidential campaign rally in the state. He said as president, his administration will address the security challenges in the country, no matter what it will take.

The PDP candidate, who expressed appreciation to the people of the state for sticking with the opposition party, also promised to provide infrastructural development in the state if voted in as president.

“Today, we are before you to reiterate our commitment, our five-programme commitment to the people of this country. One, we have promised to reunify this country. What do we mean by that? We mean we are going to give each and every part of this country a sense of belonging. You will not be excluded in anything. That is why we are being referred to as unifiers of our great nation.

“Two, we promise to restore security. Whatever it is going to take us to do it, we will restore security in this country; so that you can travel day and night. So that you can go to your farms. So that you can go anywhere secured.

“We will put more policemen on the streets. We will equip them; we will fortify them and since we have promised to devolve more powers to the states and local governments, you can also have your own local police. We shall make sure your local police don’t harass you.

“Three, we will send back all our eligible children to school. They must go to school; every child must go to school. If you remember, during the PDP years, we established compulsory primary school education from primary to secondary school and we are tasking Nigerians to educate these children.

“Again, we promise infrastructural development in the country, particularly in Edo, linking Edo to the South and linking Edo to the North. We will make sure all these roads are rehabilitated and are motorable. What is most important in a large country like Nigeria is to make sure that we have an efficient rail system,” Atiku stated.