The presidential candidate of the Young Progressive Party (YPP), Peter Agada, has claimed that he and his team developed the “consumption-to-production” policy concept that became a major theme of Peter Obi’s 2023 presidential campaign.
Agada, who served as Director of Finance for the Obidient campaign during the 2023 election, made the claim while speaking about his long-standing involvement in policy development and Nigerian politics.
According to him, he has spent several decades developing public policies and has contributed to policy documents and campaign programmes for a number of politicians seeking elective offices.
“There are things I’m struggling not to say here. A lot of these guys who are running for offices took documents off my table. Their manifestos, their programs. I’m not junior to anybody. I started writing policies in Nigeria before some people even entered politics,” Agada said.
He further said his experience in policy development spans several decades, adding that he has led the Congress of Nigerian Professionals for about 20 years.
“Some of these people running for elections right now, I don’t need to call names. So we’ve been there. I run the Congress of Nigerian Professionals. This is 20 years. This is 30 years of practice,” he said.
When asked whether Peter Obi was among the politicians for whom he had developed policies, Agada answered in the affirmative, insisting that he personally worked on policy ideas for the former Anambra State governor.
“Of course, I wrote policies for Peter Obi. The consumption-to-production infrastructure was written by me and my team under Professor Pat Utomi,” he said.
Agada maintained that the consumption-to-production concept originated from his team during their period of engagement with Obi.
“Consumption to production infrastructure was from my table. Our time,” he added.
Peter Obi, who contested the 2023 presidential election on the platform of the Labour Party, made the transition of Nigeria from a consumption-driven economy to a production-based economy one of the key pillars of his campaign.
His agenda placed emphasis on boosting domestic manufacturing, agriculture, infrastructure development and job creation.
Agada is now seeking the presidency on the platform of the YPP ahead of the 2027 general election.
