By NAOMI SHARANG

Mr Kola Abiola, eldest son of the late MKO Abiola, presumed winner of June 12, 1993 Presidential Election, has joined the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP).

Abiola was formally accepted into the party on Thursday at its National Secretariat, Abuja by Mr Falalu Bello, the National Chairman of the party.

Bello said: “I formally welcome you into our fold. Your antecedents speak volumes.”

Earlier, Abiola said: “Today makes my formal inroad after, 27 years, back into politics.

“I particularly picked to come back into politics through the PRP for some good reasons.

“I have gone back to the history of Nigeria to look at the party that truly represents Nigeria.

“I have gone back and I have found out that the oldest living party is the PRP; it still holds those ideals of what Nigeria and democratic practice should be like.”

According to him, it is a party that was started by the people and truly for the people. It is a party that has showed first, as its priority, internal democracy.

“I have come back to PRP to show Nigerians that not too long ago, we did things in the right way and the new entities that have come together nowadays forget that there was Nigeria that did things right.

“I am one that believes in an equal opportunity be it employment, be it business, equally in politics and I believe this party represents all of these.

“Everybody should have equal opportunity, irrespective of age, religion and ethnicity and that is represented here,” Abiola said.

While raising concern over the low participation of youths in politics, he said: “We have a youth population that has been caught out of the system, the political process.

“The first thing I want to do is to disrupt the political process, to disabuse the minds of the youth on godfatherism.

“The way to do this is to give the true owners of Nigeria, that is, the 18 to 36 years age group that makes up over 75 per cent of the population, an opportunity for their voices to be heard and their numbers to count.”

He said PRP is the only party that could give youths such opportunity to make their numbers count. (NAN)

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