Desist from using youths as thugs, DE Watson tells Politicians
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AS the 2019 general elections approach, a Bauchi based Youth Political Hotspots under DE Watson Leadership Academy has cautioned politicians against using Nigerians youth as thugs to harass and ferment trouble during elections.
Addressing a press conference in Bauchi Thursday, the representative of the Youth Political Hotspots, Hisham Yusuf Joda lamented the spate of political thuggery in the country saying that the activities of these political thugs had led to the killing of 10 NYSC members among others in Bauchi state as a result of the post-election crisis of 2011.
DE Watson Leadership Academy are students union leaders of tertiary institutions in the North-East under Leadtots Human Development Organization which is a project being supported by National Endowment for Democracy (NED) which is aimed at developing leadership capacities of students union leaders.
According to Yusus Joda, “Bauchi state is not left of such political thugs who always create violence in the state which has led to the destruction of lives and properties. In the past presidential election, many people were killed while properties worth millions of naira destroyed in different parts of the state. This was believed to be supporters of some political parties who unleashed terror on innocent people in the name of protecting votes cast in the favour of their party, these led to the death of NYSC members and several others”.
The group thereby called on youths to always shun political thuggery as they are leaders of tomorrow with a brighter future adding, “as youths, we must always defend our community positively instead of being used as tools for violence. We should make these sacrifice for ourselves and our future generation.”
He added that “We are calling on parents and guardians to give good home training to their children and ward because this menace can be put to an end with good home training. We also urge our leaders to be a good mentor to the youths as well as provide scholarship and Empowerment Programme for them to reduce unemployment in the country.”.
Also speaking, a female representative of the organization, Mercy A’Aron who lamented neglect of women in the leadership role called on government at all levels to give equal right to women in the society to enable them to showcase their potentials.
She also enjoined stakeholders to support and engage in mentorship Programme for young women saying “we can provide scholarship, funds, training and other assistance for women and girls who desire leadership position.
Mercy Aron thereby urged every woman to support other women in politics irrespective of age, religion, cultural background and political differences in order to achieve great success adding “we must do this for every woman on the seat of leadership today so that we can give the world reasons to trust women with leadership positions.
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