By Ehichioya Steve Odion
Frontline governorship aspirant for the Edo 2024 Governorship election on the platform of the Labour Party, LP, Bassey Ogbemudia Osagie has stated that thuggery and other social vices engaged in by youths in the society is as a result of the high unemployment level in the country.
Osagie disclosed this recently in an interview with The Groove Watch News in Benin City.
“The youths are idle, that is the reason they get involved in thuggery. Unemployment rate is very high because there are no job opportunities. Our people are suffering. A lot of them are unable to go to school. Many of them have no hope. What do you expect them to do? By by the time you have a good government in place, such as we envisage and people are educated and there are job opportunities, things will become better”.
He further said that the youths join bad gangs in order to survive and also because of fear as they thought that could give them protection. He further added that every crime has social causes, either because of poverty or such children come out of uneducated or poorly educated families. He therefore said, unless a responsible government is in place to find a lasting solution, it may result to bigger problems in the future
Continuing, Osagie said that for Edo State to grow economically the government must introduce Private Public Partnerships (PPP), for full involvement of stakeholders to achieve desired infrastructural results.
He said if elected, as governor of Edo State, that he will ensure the youths have access to financial grants to enable those who want to farm to do so without any hindrance while those who want to engage in small scale businesses, will have money to do so successfully.
“In Canada, Governments give subsidy to farmers. When they produce and they are unable to sell all their products, the government will take it from them, destroy them and pay for them. But for that, farmers will continue to run at a loss, which may equally result to closure of such businesses”.
He also promised to support the women who trade in the market with grants and protect them from multiple taxes from touts which does not allow them to grow their businesses.
The Governorship aspirant, Bassey Ogbemudia Osagie, said the Edo State Security Network will be trained in a manner that is obtainable abroad, especially in the same way he was trained as a Police officer. He said he will get the right people to effectively secure the state.
“My security company staff here in Nigeria are given the best training and equipment to do the job and that is the reason the company is doing very well and moving forward. Public security personnel should be properly remunerated to do their work effectively. If you do not punish those breaking the law you should not expect the system to work”, he concluded.
