Presidential aspirant of the Alliance for New Nigeria (ANN), Mr. Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim said at the weekend that youths of the South-east must renew the revolutionary instincts displayed by youths of the region in the pre-independence days to rescue Nigeria in 2019.
Olawepo-Hashim, who addressed members of the ANN at the party Secretariat in Abakalili and at a Youth Rally in Afikpo, Ebonyi State, said the youths of the East must re-enact the revolutionary instincts of the likes of Osita Agunna who led the Zikist Movement to deliver a deadly blow to the colonialists during the independence struggles.
The rally in Afikpo involved a four-kilometre trek from the Market square where Olawepo-Hashim commissioned a constituency project executed by a member of Ebonyi State House of Assembly, Hon. Maria Ude, to the community field where the youth rally held.
Olawepo-Hashim said: “The Eastern Region has produced real committed leaders who have displayed the spirit of self service and selflessness, which contributed to the victory in the war against colonial rule. It is that spirit that is lacking in Nigeria now
“When Nigeria was going to get out of colonial rule, young men and women in the East gathered together like this and called for a new revolution in the way the war against colonial rule was being prosecuted.”
“I am talking of people like Osita Agunna, who under the Zikist Movement in 1946 issued out ‘A call for Revolution.’ And that call inspired the coal miners in Enugu whose devastating strike to the heart of colonial order shook the colonialists to their very foundation. From 1949, after the coal miners’ strike, the struggle for colonial rule took a new dimension.
“From time immemorial, this region has produced fighters for freedom and liberty that sprang from young people who had a vision of freedom; people like Mokwugo Okoye; these are people who fought for the independence of this country.”
He told the Youths of the East to emulate the historic virtues displayed by the revolutionaries of old and send packing the two major political parties which he said have no members but only hire the youth to join their rallies.
He said: “The two big political parties have no members because they only hire youths to participate in their rallies. The ANN is revitalising the principle of party membership not hired membership.”
According to him, the ANN would build a country where Nigerians would be gainfully employed without necessarily sending everyone to the farm.
“I will be a president for all Nigerians and not some Nigerians. I will also not send all our youth to the far, because we already have too many Nigerians doing agriculture. Only four per cent of Americans are into farming and they are able to feed over 300 million people and feed the world. We will ensure that Nigerian youths who want to do agriculture do it better while other youths will be gainfully employed in critical sectors of the economy,” he said.
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