African Democratic Congress ( ADC) Presidential Aspirant, Mr. Chukwuka Monye on Wednesday 13th April, 2022 met with some leaders in Disability Community in line with his ongoing consultation of stakeholders to share his aspirations of leading Nigeria out of its present situation.
In a meeting that took place at Transcorp Hilton, Abuja, Mr. Chukwuka Monye told Persons With Disabilities that he is consulting Persons With Disabilities to understand their challenges.
He said that he developed interest in PWDs due to his relationship with some persons with disabilities during his days at Secondary School where he had a blind man by name Micheal Fadeyi who is now working with Radio Nigeria.
He said that his encounter with Micheal Fadeyi and several others infuenced his choice of career. He said that he was helping Micheal Fadeyi type his assignments which made him develop so much love for shorthand and at that time, he preferred to go for Commerce instead of medicine suggested.
He said that he took his decision to run for the office of the President because of his passion for Nigeria and Nigerian people especially for those who is underprivileged.
“I have a foundation called AG Care where we have carried out humanitarian works for the last twenty years and we have reached out to a lot of young people and Aso Rock will provide another opportunity to reach out to much more youths”.
My idea about acquiring knowledge is to impact my country but as I continued to acquire knowledge, I found out that things are getting worse in Nigeria”.
TQM reports that Mr. Chukwuka Monye who has a degree Innovation Strategy at Oxford University had 15 years experience on consultancy and he has been part of over 400 projects both public and private sector, such as Expansion of House of Tara in 2012, Every Day Supermarket, City of Lagos Monopoly Game, Save One Million Lives, Delta State Economic Forum, SMART Delta and many others.
Having motivated many projects and businesses both in public and private sector for 15 years with a plan to retire but the Nigerian State is getting worse. Nigerians are becoming hopeless and helpless.
He said that it is on this hopelessness and helplessness of Nigerians that he decided to vie and bring back the hope and dignity of Nigerians. That’s why he declared to run on 15th January, 2022 infront of over 1,000 audience at Onitsha Ugbo in Delta State.
“As someone outside the system, I have been consulting widely to prepare people’s mind to accept me because they are not used to other people who are not career politicians. We did opinion poll from January 15th and there was a lot of negative sentiment but we conducted another one at the end of February and there has been a lot of improvement.
Mr. Monye who is 42 now said that he has age and experience on his side which made him represents what Nigerian people want at this time.
He also said that his mission is simply to restore the dignity of an average Nigerian, to get Nigerians back to where they should be proud of the country.
He stated that Today’s Nigeria is for few people but he want a Nigeria that is for everyone.
Reacting to some questions from the Stakeholders about his implementation strategy of Disability Rights Act, why the choice of ADC, how he can build sense of belonging among PWDs, Can he be trusted by his promises, he said that he felt strongly that there is huge economy in harnessing the potentials in PWDs but it is unfortunate that they have been highly marginalized but he will prioritize PWDs because to a certain level, he understands the challenges having associated with so many PWDs and his time in USA has given him much idea on how to provide for PWDs.
He said that he joined ADC because he found out that the party is Inclusive, they have quota for women and PWDs.
He also said that his creative way of implementing Disability Rights Act is to increase the number of persons with disabilities in governance.
If a person with disability is appointed a minister or Director General of an agency, it will bring about provision of accessibility facilities at the public buildings and implementation of other provisions in Disability Law.
“Persons With Disabilities should be given level playing field, the more PWDs you have in governance, the more powerful their voices will become” he added.
He proffered that in order to address the issues of PWDs properly, we should promote their access to health, education, employment opportunity, social intervention programmes etc.
He also said that most of things he is talking about is things, he is already doing so they are not promises, it is just an expansion of his routine.
He also said that if he succeeds at the primaries, he will have PWDs wing in his campaign and the acronym SPEC is what he stands for which means S-Social Innovator, P-Peoples Builder, E-Excellent Driven and C-Community Oriented.
The stakeholders who attended the meeting were Dr. Chike Okogwu, (ED, Centre for Ability, Rehabilitation and Empowerment CARE), Afam Kasim from The Albino Foundation TAF, Barr. Florence Marcus( National President, Amputee Coalition of Nigeria), Okeoghene Jane Akpaeva (ED, Inclusive Voice for Women and Youth Initiative and Member, Nigeria Association of the Deaf), Favour Adjara(Finance Officer CARE), Janet Ajibade (Network for Disabled Women), and Martha Aga (Member, Abuja Association of the Deaf). The meeting was exclusively covered by The Qualitative Magazine TQM (the foremost Disability magazine in Nigeria), led by Agbo Christian Obiora.
Mr. Chukwuka Monye was born on 21st July, 1979 in Lagos State, Nigeria, where he grew up.
He attended Federal College, Ijanikin, Badagry Expressway, Lagos, then moved to Warner University, where he procured a BA in Business Administration.
Proceeding with his schooling, Chukwuka Monye acquired a Postgraduate Diploma in Strategy and Innovation just as a Masters of Business Administration from Oxford University. He is currently pursuing his doctorate degree.
