Nigeria’s ambassador to Ethiopia eyes Reps seat

Posted by admin Headlines, House, Legislature, National Politics Wednesday, December 22nd, 2010

Nigeria’s Ambassador to Ethiopia, Mrs. Nkoyo Toyo, has expressed intention to pick a Peoples Democratic Party ticket to the House of Representatives.

Toyo, who is also Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the African Union Commission, told the News Agency of Nigeria in Addis Ababa that she was seeking to represent the Calabar/Odukpani Federal Constituency of Cross River State.

She said she had already submitted her intent form to the party’s secretariat.

Toyo said she was seeking the seat because democracy had taken a good shape in Nigeria, especially with new party instruments, courts and the Independent National Eelectoral Commission preparing for acceptable elections.

She said her election into the House of Representatives would give her an opportunity to champion women participation in politics and the cause of the less privileged.

“My political project will be to champion women participation in politics. We need a sizeable number of women in politics. We need to have a platform in politics to enable us to move forward and actualise our dreams of contributing to the development of our country,” she said.

Toyo said as an activist, she had achieved a lot in women groups within and outside the country.

“I could be an actor in the National Assembly to speak exclusively on women and the less privileged. Being an activist and in my position as the ambassador to the AU and UNECA is very strategic and has widened my knowledge and agenda,” she noted.

Toyo said Nigeria needed to take its place in the global agenda and comity of nations both at the AU and the United Nations.

She lamented that for about 15 years, Nigeria had not reviewed its foreign policy. She said the nation must be keen in pushing its new diplomatic agenda through the Commonwealth, the AU and the UN.

Toyo pledged that if elected, she would introduce a project to be known as ‘Small Governance,’ as one of her pet projects that would inculcate into Nigerians the virtue of service delivery.

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