Mindful of the need to encourage youths to be actively involved in the governance, university lecturers have urged them to be more strategic in order to ensure a generational shift in the body polity.
Prof. Oshita O. Oshita, Director-General, Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution, Prof. Suleiman Bala Mohammed of Nasarawa State University, Prof. Saadatu Liman, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Admin), Nasarawa State University gave the recommendation at a Roundtable programme on political education for youth in Nigeria when the African Centre for Media and Information Literacy (ARICMIL) took its political awareness programme to universities.
They stressed that the youth must know what they want and they must acquire all the requisite knowledge that is needed to be relevant in the scheme of things.
The Roundtable was organised by the African Centre for Media and Information Literacy (ARICMIL) in collaboration with the Ubutu Centre for Africa Peacebuilding and Development (UCAP) and the Institute of Strategic and Development Communication (ISDEVCOM), Nasarawa State University, Keffi and ROSA Luxemburg Foundation.
Oshita noted that, as a competent observer of development in Nigeria and the role of the youth, “my advice to the youth is that they have to be more strategic, they have to know what they want and then go out to take it, because nothing will be given to them unless they take it.
“Taking it is not by force but it is by strategising. You have to know what you want. If youths want leadership, they have to come together, they have to plan together, and they have to ensure that they do not allow any moneybags to break their ranks.
For the reason that we are in an environment of poverty, youths simply allow politicians to break their ranks by giving them peanuts but that cannot be equated with what the future holds for them.
“So, youths must strategise well and work together and have alliances with those who respect them and who know that they are a force to reckon with,” he said.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Administration), Prof. Liman on her part, said the youth must not allow themselves to be used in election processes, rather they should be active players.
“It is imperative that the youth participate in elections as they are usually used in a negative way in Nigeria. Nigeria has been perverted by poverty and other vices which we need to change. And if we need to change, the youth have to grab the mantle of leadership, they have to be aware, and be educated so that they would use their education to play a positive kind of leadership and politics that the country would be proud of. We need them to be aware of entrepreneurs so as to take Nigeria to the next level.”
Mr Kola Ogunbiyi, AFRICMIL Programme Officer said the programme was meant to improve the capacity of youth so as to make them positive change agents.
He said: “We thought it was necessary to build the capacity of the youth in politics. It is just to encourage them not to be discouraged by what they see currently and also to prepare them for the future.
“If you look at the situation in Nigeria, they make the politics look like it is just for the rich alone. But if you don’t have knowledge that “this country belongs to all of us, and that this is how I can make my own contribution,” you won’t understand what you need to do as a youth and that was why we thought it very important to build their capacity at this level so as to prepare them for the future.”
Angela Odah, Programme Manager, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, West Africa said it was not the responsibility of the government or the political elite to hand over power to the youth, rather “power should rightly be in the hands of the populace and the youth, especially in a country such as Nigeria with a very high population of youth who are the future of this country.
“Ideally, if we have youths that are politically conscious, they should be at the driver’s seat. Since the leaders are supposed to be accountable to the citizens and so they should be at the driver’s seat to hold people in the government accountable and ensure that whatever policies that are put in place, either politically, economically, or socially, are all towards the common good of the populace.”
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