Nigeria requires a radical thinker like me to address her problems—Okorocha

THOMAS IMONIKHE

Imo West senator and All Progressives Congress, APC, presidential hopeful, Rochas Okorocha has identified visionary leadership and radical thinking as two attributes that stand him out among other aspirants jostling for the party’s ticket to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari in 2023.

According to him, as a radical thinker, he has designed a blueprint that would, if  elected president, enable his administration create wealth in an unprecedented scale never experienced before in the country to address hunger, poverty, unemployment and insecurity ravaging the land.

Okorocha, a former two-term governor of Imo State who, had earlier declared his intention to seek the APC’s ticket to contest in the 2023 presidential election disclosed these Tuesday in Abuja while interacting with members of his strategic team.

He maintained that the current myriads of challenges confronting the country required a visionary leadership and radical thinker like him that can rationalize outside the box for solutions adding that the increasing number of out of school children expected to jump to over 16million next year remained a time bomb waiting to explode.

He said his background as a frontline educationist who has built 14 private schools and offered scholarships to over 25,000 students, experience in the private sector and exceptional performance as governor when he made education free at all levels for eight years clearly stand him out amongst other aspirants in the APC.

The senator insisted that the nation needed a complete break from the past when those who were former employees of government got elected as presidents since independence stressing that a radical thinker like him with uncommon capacity to create wealth is what is needed to salvage our fatherland.

Okorocha added that his plan for wealth creation and its multiplier effects has the potential to address abject poverty, provide jobs, boost productivity which are at the heart of current insecurity manifesting as kidnapping, ritual killings, insurgency, terrorism and banditry in the country.

“As a visionary leader I have what it takes to create wealth for our teeming populace, thereby addressing the issues of poverty, insecurity and youth restiveness”, he declared.

Continuing, he said no amount of weapons deployed by security forces fighting insurgents, terrorists and other criminals would completely eliminate them without a comprehensive plan by government to address the major causes by creating wealth and jobs for the millions of youth currently roaming the streets for employment adding that the devil will always find jobs for idle hands.

He said as governor, the Imo State government despite its low revenue allocation from the Federation Account executed over 2000 projects in eight years and turned land assets into unprecedented revenue spinner to the extent that a plot of land now cost about N100million in parts of the state.

The inability of leaders to identify the nation’s problems and proffer appropriate solutions and hunger were at the root of the country woes, he added.

Okorocha revealed that his growing up in the north and investments nationwide clearly portray him as a unifier that Nigeria needs at this critical stage of her development and history.