President Muhammadu Buhari has observed that Nigeria’s population and natural resources have put the country in a tight situation among comity of nations because everybody expects it to do well.
He stated this on Friday while receiving members of the National Planning and Implementation Committee of the first National Youth Open Water Swimming Competition, tagged Youth Unity Cup 2016 at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Attributing the huge expectation from Nigeria to the country’s quality human and material resources, the President charged Nigerians, particularly the youths be up and about in order to show the world that the country’s population was not for nothing.
According to him, “Our size as Nigeria, our natural resources and our population have put us in a very difficult position, not only in Africa but throughout the world.
“Everybody expects Nigeria to perform because of our quality human and material resources. So this is putting a lot of responsibilities on us, especially the youth.
“We just have to be up and doing in order to show Africa and the rest of the world that our size and number are not for nothing. We should prove that we can produce competitive individuals and we are able to manage ourselves.
“I am pleased to be associated with this event. I have been told how you have been training very hard. Please, try to convince your colleagues to be more competitive so that you can justify our size and our resources.
In his remarks, the Chairman of Senate Committee on Works, Senator Kabir Gaya, who led the delegation, described the competition as “an exceptional initiative that will mark a massive turnaround in sporting development of Nigeria.”
He commended Buhari for what he called his “deep concern” in building a better Nigeria for the youth, stating that the objectives of the competition is to raise a pool of responsive young Nigerian swimmers; discover hidden talents and breed future stars and professionals to represent Nigeria in international swimming competitions; as well as to promote cohesion, national peace, unity and security among youths.
Gaya went on to list the developmental strides of the present administration to include: commitment to the anti-graft campaign; the multi-billion naira youth empowerment fund; N-Power Youth Entrepreneurship Development and Empowerment Programme for over 500,000 youths; market women empowerment; as well as massive boost and investment in agricultural development and rice cultivation.
