Kachikwu: I’ll Ban Foreign Schools, Hospitals for Public Officers, Families

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

Presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Mr. Dumebi Kachikwu, yesterday, vowed to stop public officers and their families from attending foreign schools and hospitals if elected president next year.
 Kachikwu stated this at a town hall meeting in Abuja.

To achieve this, the ADC presidential candidate, said he would sponsor a bill at the National Assembly that would be known as the Nigerian Patriot Act.
This piece of legislation, he said, would give all Nigerians, a level playing ground in terms of public facilities.

He described as unfair, situations, where public officers take advantage of the privileged positions to enroll their children in foreign schools on government bills.
He also said it does not make any sense for any Nigerian leader at any tier of of government to patronise foreign hospitals for medical care.

“We can’t have different rules for different criminals. If you do the crime, you do the time. If given the privilege to lead you, my first executive interface with the National Assembly will include a bill I have dubbed the Nigerian Patriot Act. It is a bill of equality and fairness.

“It is a bill that says we are all in this together. It is a bill that ensures that public servants cannot use the privileges they cannot provide to the common man. If you desire to be in the public service, you must use the same services the masses use.

“No private or foreign schools for our families, no private or foreign hospitals for us or our families, no generators or boreholes in our homes. If we desire efficient and effective education, healthcare, utilities, etc we must make it available to all, so that we may all equally benefit from it. This is how we will build a nation that works for everyone,”Kachikwu said.

The ADC Presidential Candidate, therefore, pledged to tackle insecurity with modern technologies and by recruiting additional one million soldiers into the Nigerian Army, adding that the money needed to fight insecurity and insurgency would not be diverted but would be strictly channeled to the purpose it was meant to address.

“Insecurity would be tackled effectively with technology and we would decentralise our Security institutions for efficiency,” he said, even as he condemned the current practice, where the federal government was borrowing foreign loans to construct amenities that would only benefit a few people in the society.