By Laide Akinboade, Abuja

The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike on Tuesday said provision of security and job creation for the residents, are key priority areas on the list of his agenda of his administration.

The minister made this known when the British high commissioner to Nigeria, Richard Montgomery paid him a visit in his office in Abuja.

According to him, the United Kingdom and Nigeria had a long relationship since the colonial period to Independence; the relationship has been stronger and stronger.

Wike who was responding to the request of the commissioner on priority areas of the administration, said his interest is centered on the priority of President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda which is anchored on eight priorities.

Tinubu had on assumption  of office in 2023 listed 8 priority areas of his administration which include food security, ending poverty, economic growth and job creation, access to capital, improving the playing field on which people and particularly companies operate, rule of law and fighting corruption.

Wike said the problems have not been all solved but there is significant progress in addressing them.

He explained that security in Abuja seems to be different because of the boundary states of Nasarawa, Niger, Kogi and Kaduna.

The minister stated that the states have high activities of bandits and it appears that when they are getting it hot in those states they run to Abuja.

Wike said, “Two months ago, it did appear to be too hot but you can now see that the level of criminal activities have come down very well because of the level of support and the commitment of security agencies particularly the police.

“We gave the police and other security agencies a lot of logistics support and that is how I help them effectively to support the fight, this helps to calm particularly banditry and kidnapping, I can tell you that we have made tremendous progress in terms of arresting the kidnappers.

“There is no part of this world where there won’t be any form of criminality, what is important is the swiftness of security agencies to apprehend and also try to prosecute those that are involved, so am happy with what we have done.

“We also realized that before now it does appear that there are no activities in Abuja, many people complain that Abuja is down but as we came on board activities have come on board.

“We are proud to say that we have turned the Abuja site which was not the case in the last past 8 years to a construction site.

“Creating of job is a priority, what that will mean to the teaming youths is that, more creation of job is not only where it is white cola job, by these activities youths are involved, if you go to the area councils today there are a lot of jobs going on there, that has created way for the youths to be employed.

In his remarks, British high commissioner to Nigeria, Richard Montgomery, said the visit was critical because of the important role the minister and his team play in the commission.

He said, “I have come to seek your view and understanding of approaches to the development of the Federal Capital Territory considering the many initiatives we have seen in the press which will lead to the prosperity of FCT.

“There have been security issues in the recent past, especially kidnapping, we want to get an update on the issue, also in a closed door meeting I will give you more updates on UK and Nigeria bilateral relationships.

“In the last few days, we have step up our engagements to the Federal Republic of Nigeria and a few weeks ago, the UK hosted the Nigeria defence on security and defence partnership, we shall be looking at how the business environment can be better as well”

Montgomery said the British Commission was interested in understanding the areas of priority to help in the bilateral relationship.