Kunle ADELABU
The former Lagos State Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Primate Charles Odugbesi, has appealed to the Governor of Lagos State, Mr Akinwunmi Ambode, to bring back the holiday job introduced by his predecessor, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola,SAN.
He made the appeal in an exclusive interview with THE IMPACT recently.
Primate Odugbesi stated that the scheme was a good initiative, adding that it had helped many students and their parents in getting money to finance their education.
Odugbesi, who was also the former scribe of Action Congress (AC) and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), had took to the social media few months back to complain about the lukewarm attitude of the present administration towards the welfare of party members in the State in a piece titled, ‘ACME, ACME, ACME In Those Days”.
Though, the piece generated lots of controversies, Odugbesi stated that Governor Ambode read it and acted swiftly on the issues raised and even did better than they were used to.
He, however, revealed his plan to write the governor again on another issue and expressed belief that the message would get to him using THE IMPACT platform.
“I’m planning to write him again on another issue and I believe that using your platform, the message will get across to the governor. It’s about the holiday jobs introduced by the administration of Mr Fashola.
“ It helped a lot and I think the governor should reintroduce it. The scheme provides holiday job opportunities to secondary school and tertiary institution students and if a child spends two months collecting N20,000, that is something for his or her parents in preparing him or her for the next session.
“Money realized can be used in buying necessary school materials when they are going back to school and also take care of the children’s other needs. I want to talk to him about this but I have not been opportuned to do that.”
He stated that students in higher institutions also benefitted from the scheme as they were equally employed during that period.
“ It also benefited those in the tertiary institutions because it provided them with money to take care of themselves and also engaged them while on holidays.”
Odugbesi also stated that, “Money realized will help parents procure sandals, books, bags,socks, etc for their wards. The scheme would also helps in providing those in tertiary institutions with working experience.”
He also urged the senator representing Lagos East Senatorial district and other representatives to intervene in making the governor to reintroduce the scheme while also challenging them to also help in engaging the students during holidays.
“People are not happy that the practice has been stopped. This is one of those things we expect our Senator to raise with the governor. Likewise, our senator too can provide holiday jobs for these students. I have people in Ikorodu who are involved in Back-to-School projects, what is our senator doing in this respect? Our Senator should be able to save at least N2million monthly out of what he’s getting for back-to-school project”, he urged.
