Ogun APC candidate pledges 500,000 jobs and local-government autonomy

Senator Solomon Adeola, the All Progressives Congress candidate for governor of Ogun State, has promised to create more than 500,000 jobs and train 100,000 young people in digital skills if elected in the 2027 general election. Adeola made the pledge during a courtesy visit to the Ogun State Council of the Nigerian Union of Journalists at the Iwe Iroyin Press Centre in Abeokuta on Friday. He said journalists should hold him accountable for the programme he described as a covenant with residents.

The senator, who represents Ogun West, said his administration would focus on infrastructure, industrialisation, agriculture, healthcare, education, security and institutional reform. He said a Youth Enterprise Hub would be established in Abeokuta within six months of taking office, with satellite centres elsewhere in the state and microcredit for young entrepreneurs. Adeola said 100,000 young people would receive digital-skills training by 2031.

He linked the planned job creation to measures intended to reduce youth unemployment by 40 per cent, although the source material gives no further details on how the target would be calculated. On local government, Adeola pledged to respect the 2024 Supreme Court judgment on financial autonomy. He said allocations would go directly to Ogun’s 20 councils without state-level interception or diversion, arguing that government must be felt at the grassroots.

His infrastructure proposals include a bus mass-transit programme on corridors such as Abeokuta, Sango-Ota and Sagamu. He also proposed working with the Nigerian Railway Corporation on commuter services between Abeokuta and Lagos, and links between industrial areas and the Lagos rail network. Adeola further promised an OgunRide platform offering commercial drivers health insurance, vehicle financing and cooperative support.

Other proposals covered affordable housing, sports facilities, agricultural processing, healthcare and industrial development.