The national women leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr. Betta Edu has submitted that any youth that can’t raise N50m for the party’s nomination form should not be thinking of contesting the 2023 presidency.
Edu made the submission on Thursday while defending the N100m price tag slammed on the APC presidential nomination form by the ruling party.
VAM News reports however that the party also slashed the cost of nomination forms by 50% for young aspirants in the party, meaning such interested persons would have to cough out N50m.
The APC National Youth Leader, Dayo Israel, made this known in a tweet via his Twitter handle on Wednesday.
The hefty price tag has however attracted various criticisms from Nigerians.
But defending the decision of the party, Edu said anybody that wants to manage the huge resources of Nigeria as its president must be able to prove that he/she can manage beyond N50m so such a person won’t misbehave when he/she gets into power.
She added that for the youths interested in elective positions, it’s not compulsory the funds must be their personal money but they should be able to get people (including crowdfunding) who believe in them and are ready to stake so much for them including raising the needed funds.
She went further to say N50m is not all that it takes to contest a presidential election in Nigeria but such aspirants must have the resources to travel the length and breadth of the country for campaigns as beyond buying the nomination form, there are still several other things to spend money on which the aspirant must budget for.
“There are many ways that young people can generate funding for elections,” she said in an interview with Arise TV.
She added that “If you want to be able to cater for Nigerians, you should have gone above the point where you have to look for N50 million,” as you must be able to prove your ability to manage “so much funds if you’re given that opportunity”.
“When you make up your mind that you want to run, you should be able to prepare adequately for that race. Beyond that, there are many ways that young people can generate funding for elections. It mustn’t be your money. There are many ways young people can generate funds to run for whatever elections they have. Remember, they are not paying 100 percent of whatever others are paying,” Edu said.
“If you’re a young person who truly people believe in you and you truly have the masses, there’s fundraising.
“If you want to run for the president of Nigeria. You need to go through the 36 states; remember that the law states you must have at least 25 percent across the board for you to be able to emerge. So it’s beyond picking up form and sitting down in one place and probably winning only one polling unit, and you say you want to run. That’s not what we should offer as a ruling party; we need to put some seriousness and scale into the game.
“And if you want to be able to cater for Nigerians, you should have gone above the point where you have to look for N50 million. If you don’t even have access to N50 million and you want to run for the presidency, then there is a problem already. How are we sure that you’ll be able to manage so much funds if you’re given that opportunity.”
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