Senate Deputy Chief Whip and Senator Representing Ebonyi North Senatorial zone, Senator Onyekachi Nwebonyi has called on Nigerian Youths, Graduates to embark on Agriculture other than waiting for a white collar job.
According to him, it is only Agriculture that can return Nigeria to it’s position as the giant of Africa.
Nwebonyi stated this at the weekend during the disbursement of 2200 bags of fertilizer allocated to his Constituents by the federal government.
“I want to use this opportunity to call Nigerians, particularly the youth and the graduates, to see agriculture as the way to go. With agriculture, you don’t need a white-collar job. As I said earlier, our morals towards agriculture are completely zero, hence the need to rethink and move towards agriculture. With agriculture, Nigeria can come back as the Giant of Africa”.
The lawmaker also frowned at the delay of the fertilizer from the federal ministry of Agriculture was has forfeited the main aim of the support to agrarians.
He said; “And I want to use this opportunity to say, that whosoever sources the fertilizer came to us, the fertilizer is coming late. It’s late, and the purpose will be forfeited because when you give farm inputs to farmers on time, it will help them to plan to be more realistic than giving fertilizer when they are harvesting. It’s completely out of it,” he said.
The Senator then call on President Ahmed Tinubu, to investigate the delay, in the distribution of the fertilizer. “If it’s from the Ministry of Agriculture or CBN, it must be investigated, because in this part of the country, particularly in Ebonyi State, when you fail to give fertilizer to the farmers between June and July, you are wasting your time. I want to apologize to the people of Ebonyi North Senatorial District for receiving their fertilizer quite late.
“We just did our new yam festival and started harvesting our yam; where are we going to use our fertilizer if not for the next farming season? So, I want to urge the Honourable Minister of Agriculture and Food Security to sit up and stop this insult – it’s an insult to the Senate, and it’s an insult to Nigerians.
“It means that the Minister is not serious about how he can bring fertilizer when people are already harvesting. It’s uncalled for and Mr President should investigate this. Nigerians want results in all our policies and programs. If we say we are giving farm inputs to the Nigerian farmers, give them inputs between March and June to enable them to plan, not give them inputs in the middle or towards the end of the farming season.
“This is not acceptable. This is not the way to go, and we must correct ourselves. We are Nigerians, and God must not come down from heaven to make Nigeria better. It’s we, the government – the leaders and the led (followers) will do this,” he stated.
Nwebonyi thanked Mr President for supporting Nigeria farmers with incentive which is the only measures to fight the food insecurity facing the nation as at today.
He then pleaded with Nigerians to exercise more patients with the President Tinubu led administration.
” Let me use this opportunity to appeal to the Nigerians to be patient with Mr President because when you look at his policies and programs, you will see a man who is out to change our narratives as a nation.
“If you look at the student loan scheme, by that program what President Tinubu has done is that he has given scholarships to all Nigerians who want to acquire tertiary education because no Nigerian will drop out of school as a result of the inability to pay school fees. That’s why Mr President came on board with the student loan scheme, and Nigerian youths should take advantage of this; no President of this country ever did this, but only President Tinubu and we must appreciate it.
“He has done more in the agriculture sector by removing some taxes on food importation. These are practical steps Mr President has taken to cushion the effects of the fuel subsidy removal and we urge Nigerians to support him.”
Speaking on the Security of farmers in their farmlands, the deputy chief whip said “The Tenth Senate has done very well in the area of security. Within our one year in the Senate, we summoned the security chiefs, up to four times, and in this issue, we extracted from them words of commitment to providing security to Nigerians, particularly the farmers in the hinterlands.
“The bad news you just shared with us is that I believe when we resume, we are going to review the security architecture across the nation because, without security, the farmers can’t go into the farm, not minding the inputs we are giving to them. It’s one of the things we will look into on the first or second week of September of our resumption at the plenary.”
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