The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress for the July 14, 2018 Ekiti State governorship poll, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, has concluded his visits to all the 133 communities across the state to seek support of voters.
Fayemi said he will provide visionary leadership through his Eight-Point Agenda to redirect the state to the path of growth and development “after four years of rudderless leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party”.
Fayemi also warned Governor Ayodele Fayose against illegal collection of workers’ voter cards through coercion, saying the voters have inalienable right to vote for candidate of their choice.
According to reports, in the last two weeks, Fayose had ordered school principals and some interest groups among teachers to collect the names, bank accounts and voter cards details of teachers in public schools for profiling.
Fayemi said workers should be allowed to cast their votes for their preferred candidates in the coming election without any fear of intimidation by the government or its officials.
He added that compelling workers and teachers to submit their PVC numbers as a condition for salary and running grants payment or promotion amounted to undue intimidation and crude blackmail.
Fayemi made these declarations while speaking with reporters in his Isan-Ekiti country home in Oye Local Government, the last town he visited in his three-week campaign tour of the 132 towns and villages in the 16 local government areas of the state.
He lamented that Fayose shut down the School of Agriculture Technology in Isan Ekiti and took away all the tractors and other modern farming tools in the school “at a time many other states are breaking new grounds in agriculture development and food sufficiency”.
He explained that the College of Agriculture was designed to assist in training manpower in the agriculture sector that would in turn boost agricultural production in the state.
He also lamented that Fayose “out of ignorance” stopped the Youth in Commercial Agricultural Development scheme by his administration, saying all the poor decisions by Fayose’s administration had drastically affected agricultural production in the state.
He promised to re-open the College of Agriculture and revitalise YCAD scheme, including other social security and empowerment schemes initiated by his last administration.
He also said the state government under his watch would build one cottage industry in each of the local government areas to provide employment for the teeming youth.