Enugu state youths at the weekend gave resounding ovation and endorsement to the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state, Dr Peter Mbah, vowing to come out in large number to vote for him on the Election Day as his manifesto had given them “more than” they wanted for the state.

They stated that Mbah’s manifesto which covered education, health, agriculture, social infrastructure, youth empowerment among others would take the state to greater heights if well implemented and urged the people of the state to give him the needed support during next month’s elections.

The youths gave their assurances at an interactive town-hall meeting tagged “A Day with Peter Mbah: Dissecting the Philosophy of Tomorrow is Here”, which was organised by Kwado Peter Mbah, a frontline support group in Enugu, held at the International Conference Centre, Institute of Management and Technology (IMT), Enugu.

They stressed that Mbah had connected with the youths through the youth empowerment and scholarship programmes of the Peter Mbah Foundation and his laudable manifesto geared towards the empowerment of the citizens, especially the young ones. 

According to the jubilant youths, the PDP gubernatorial flagbearer had been able to show, through his robust programmes designed to turn the state into a technological, entrepreneurial and industrial hub that the youths were at the forefront of his ideology and governance philosophy.

Convener of the support group, Monday Diamond Ani, stated that they resolved to rally youths across the state for Mbah’s governorship project because of their strong desire to see a new Enugu State, which the PDP candidate envisioned in the his “excellent manifesto. 

“We choose to support Dr. Peter Mbah because of his competence, humility and what he has to offer the youths when he comes to power. Our gathering here today is to show that the youths of our state love him and that they need him at a time like this to pilot the affairs of our state,” he said. 

Diamond, who commended Mbah’s entrepreneurial exploits in the private sector, added that the youth would leave no stone unturned in giving him victory in the March 11 polls. 

Fielding numerous questions ranging from housing, education, social amenities, security, agriculture as well as place of non-indigenes amid unending cheers from the mammoth crowd of youths, Mbah described them as the heroes and heroines of the tomorrow, saying that his motivation was to create an enabling environment where the youths could fulfill their potentials, discover their hidden talents, and compete creatively within the emerging global order. 

“You are the tomorrow that is here, literally speaking. How do we build that tomorrow? First, we have to adopt the can-do spirit, and second, create an enabling environment where you can thrive. Tomorrow is here, represents the compelling vision of the innate can-do spirit to better the lots of our people,” he stated. 

While espousing his sector-by-sector programmes for the state, which he called integrated development programmes, Mbah maintained that the youth were at the core of his governance philosophy, adding that he would surmount the plethora of challenges facing them by providing the facilities for their training, education, skill, human capital development and empowerment, and turning the youth into productive assets.

He also explained that with the policies and programmes that would be set up by his administration, Enugu youths could easily fit into the world of robotic science, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, augmented reality, mechatronics, e-commerce and Fintech that would give them an edge over others. 

The entrepreneur further stated that as a way of making the youths productive by transforming them from job seekers to wealth creators and employment generators, his administration would build a tier-4 hyper scale cloud neutral data centre and incubation centres with high speed internet, unrestrained access to data, uninterrupted power supply and workstations to enable them operate in the cybernetics space.

He stressed that his government would prioritize science, technology, engineering and mathematics even as technical and vocational training centres would be made available to impart new skills in the youths in order to meet up with the demands of investors in the state.

He said: “Our duty is to ensure you’re skillfully equipped so that you can be digitally transformed to play in those emerging features and get you prepared as competent workforce for investors when they come in to invest”. 

The frontline governorship candidate further promised to establish agro-allied processing industries that would hasten industrial revolution and lead to the “Made in Enugu” products for export, attract investors by de-risking investment flow and providing the attractive environment through ease of business doing, massive infrastructure and security. 

While encouraging the youths to see his candidacy as the best, Mbah assured that his policies would displace the traditional models of doing things with technologically inclined models, which would give the young ones an environment often associated with the developed nations.

Meanwhile, 10 lucky youths went home with 10 personal computers.

Ends