AFTER widespread consultations with stakeholders, Mr Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim has officially declared his bid for the All Progressives Congress (APC) 2023 presidential ticket.
Olawepo-Hashim is to obtain the APC nomination and expression of interest forms on Thursday at the party’s secretariat in Abuja.
He noted that despite the fact that the country is presently gripped in the claws of insecurity, among several other challenges, a new and better Nigeria is still possible.
The business mogul said, “The current political trajectory of the country is dim and dark, as deep ethnic cleavages and bigotry have dominated the landscape accentuating the crises, undermining any initiative for a cohesive national redemption.
“The culprits for this immediate state of affairs are the dominant elite of Nigeria across party lines whose motive has been self-interest and personal aggrandizement, especially in the past 24 years after the unfortunate decades of military rule.”
The 2019 presidential aspirant maintained that although the patriotic national ethos of our great First Republic leaders which made Nigeria one of the leading countries of Asia and Africa with comparative gross domestic product with Malaysia and Thailand has been effectively buried, there still exist an incredible reservoir of national energy capable of pulling the nation from the ruins and destruction, and for the construction of a new and better Nigeria.
“This abundant energy is able to bring light to overshadow the darkness that is enveloping our nation. There is a fire in the belly of an average patriotic Nigerian, which when lit, is able to consume any imaginable size of evil.
“I have stepped out to ignite that fire, in my decision to seek the presidency of the Federal Republic of Nigeria during the 2023 election.
“Mine is not an ambition but a historic burden. It is a burden imposed on me right from my late teens when as an undergraduate youth activist, my generation committed themselves to the struggle for social and economic development of Nigeria, as well as to the struggle for democratic rule.”
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The Global Oil Executive also maintained that “a modern Nigeria capable of securing itself from internal and external threats, provide jobs for her teeming youths currently unemployed through a sustainable economic development plan, and reduce the scourge of poverty and corruption is possible and realizable.”
He promised to bridge the existing divides in the nation, heal the wounds and bring Nigeria back together again.
“By reason of accident, my father came from northern Nigeria and my mother from the South. Half of my family are Christians while the other half are Muslims.
“I have lived and schooled in both North and South as well as in Europe and America. I know that all human beings are born equal and deserving of equal rights, opportunities and justice.
“I will do justice to all without discrimination on account of ethnicity, religion and gender. This is not another empty promise of another politician. It is who I am,” he said.
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