Osinbajo backs quotas for young APC aspirants, 107 contestants jostle for Gombe Assembly

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has expressed support for the request by young aspirants under the platform of All Progressives Congress (APC) to be given quotas in elective offices.

According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Osinbajo’s stance was communicated in a statement by Senior Special Assistant to the Vice President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Laolu Akande, yesterday in Abuja.

The Vice President, who commended youths for their desire to contribute to nation-building in their various constituencies through active involvement in politics, urged them to make needed sacrifices to ensure the ideals they want to see in the country were realised.He said: “We are in a place where we are the ones who can make the difference; nothing is going to change overnight, but we can make efforts to change the process.

“We can do a lot more, but it depends on our commitment. I like the idea of young people getting a quota in the party structure to run for office on some levels, such as the state Houses of Assembly.He said that it was important to encourage young people to participate at all levels of the party.

The Vice President, who said he strongly believed that the future of the party depended on people who were committed to building a party that was based on ideals that were deemed important, said: “ As a young person, I belonged to several pressure groups. I graduated at the age of 21.

“And when I graduated, I began to participate in various pressure groups, human rights organisations, anti-corruption, civil society groups of every kind.“My first involvement in government was when I was appointed as Attorney General in Lagos State.

After serving as Lagos Attorney-General, I was part of the party, I did not have a board appointment or anything, but I kept working for the party.”In another development, no fewer than 107 aspirants on the platform of APC have declared interest and purchased the nomination form to contest for the 24 seats in Gombe State House of Assembly.

The Zonal Vice Chairman (South) of the party, Mr. Julius Ishaya, disclosed this yesterday while speaking with newsmen in Gombe, said out of the 107 aspirants, five are females from the southern zone of the state while two are physically-challenged from the central zone. Ishaya, who stated that the party had stopped the sale of nomination forms at the state level, expressed satisfaction with the way and manner the aspirants procured the forms at the party’s secretariat in the state.