Nigerians have been warned to be wary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. They will take the country back to food importation the era, the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council (APC PCC), warned.

The Director of the Council’s Agro Commodities Directorate, Alhaji Abubakar Udulu Bello, gave the warning yesterday at the National Farmers Stakeholders Engagement/Mobilisation Forum Summit.

The summit was organised to dissect the agricultural manifesto of the APC.

Bello noted that Nigeria, under the APC-led administration, has been able to produce what we need and the country was already gearing up for export.

He, however, expressed concern over the PDP candidate’s electioneering promise to open the nation’s borders, a policy that would encourage the return of the era of massive food and weapon importation at the detriment of the country.

Bello warned that over 70 newly established integrated rice mills and other agricultural investments would go moribund and millions of youths would be thrown into the unemployment market should Atiku be elected.

Bello said: “We cannot afford to allow in a clueless government that had already promised to open the national borders and take us back to the era of massive food and weapons import and make our over 70 newly established integrated rice mills and other agricultural investments to become moribund and our youths unemployed.”

He assured Nigerians that the presidential candidate of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, would build on the foundation laid in the agriculture sector by President Muhammed Buhari.

Secretary to the Directorate, Retson Tedheke, said the federal government, under Tinubu, will treat the agricultural sector as a national security issue, not just a commercial venture.

Tedkeke assured the party’s presidential candidate of the resolved of farmers in the country to deliver over 12 million votes for Tinubu and his running mate, Senator Kashim Shetimma at the February 25 poll.

In a keynote address, Agriculture and Rural Development the Minister, Mohammad Abubakar, described agriculture as a sustainable path to wealth for Nigeria adding that farmers made more money under the President Muhammadu Buhari administration.

The minister said: “In the last eight years, farmers have never had it this good. When he (Buhari) was elected in 2015, he made it a point to turn Nigeria into an agric giant that we should have been years back.

“In the 1960s, Nigeria was an agricultural giant, exporting commodities all over the world. The infrastructure that was built around this time from earnings in agriculture.

“After the discovery of oil we went to sleep as far agriculture is concerned. Then we realised that oil is a fluke and that it can disappear and cause climate change.

“Farmers – small, medium and large – have made more money in the last seven and half years than in the previous administrations. This administration has made more budgetary provisions and special intervention in the agric space than the previous governments.

“This administration has made sure that on the world front, Nigeria is a shining example. We are rice self-sufficient. We are number one in Africa. We are number one in cassava in the whole world.”