SPEECH PRESENTED BY HON. EMMANUEL A. IBESHI AT THE ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR PEACE BUILDING AND SOCIAL JUSTICE HELD IN JOS PLATEAU STATE ON NOVEMBER 30-DECEMBER 2ND 2023
It is widely believed that expanding youth political engagement is an essential national priority to confront the complexity of societal concerns. In order to engage youth effectively in political transformation, we need to develop more substantial and thoughtful approaches. The youth is generally defined as people between the ages of 15 and 29 but in our clime, we can extend the age limit to 35 in this presentation.
Highlighting the acknowledgement of greater youth participation by those concerned about the state of the Nigerian democracy is a crucial point. Youth participation only serves as a means to identify solutions but also plays a role in enhancing public perception of government legitimacy. This connection between youth involvement and the legitimacy of government speaks to the potential impact of active participation on a broader political landscape.
The influence of new media and technology, global demographic shifts and the challenges posed by violent conflicts as factors shaping today’s political landscape support the need for youth participation in the contemporary context. Some of the challenges youths face are unemployment, poverty, inequality, discrimination, violence, corruption, lack of representation and disillusionment. These challenges are double sided. They pose as both challenges and opportunities for the youth who constitutes a greater portion of the active demographic trend.
The acknowledgement that these challenges have influenced the way young people interact with each other, engage with their governments, and organize themselves for influence in the society is a major consideration on the overall view of their strategic position in society. This underscores the dynamic nature of youth political activism and the need for adaptable engagement programs that align with emerging global trends.
The recurrent problem of youth exclusion and challenges associated with electoral processes in Nigeria shows an intricate inter-relationship between political engagement, socio-economic inequalities and the obstacles faced by young people. The disparities in the age of eligibility for voting, running for an elective office combined with the monetization of electoral processes contribute to the unfortunate exclusion or emasculation of the youth from effective political participation.
The significant percentage of registered voters being young people underscores their potential impact on the electoral conversation. However, the challenges posed by extra judicial killings, widespread disenfranchisement and violent conflicts goes a long way to expose the hindrance to effective youth participation. When voters are not counted due to political interference or intentional shortcomings in the electoral commission’s performance, it indeed becomes a foundation for setbacks in national unity and economic development.
The effective involvement of young people in politics is influenced by a variety of circumstances. For instance, the “Not Too Young to Run Act”, reduced the age requirement for the office of PRESIDENT to 35 years and that of HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES to 25 years respectively. While this intervention gave the Nigerian youth a breather, it unfortunately has NOT generated the necessary political engagement expected to produce a credible recruitment process to produce the kind of charismatic, transformative and democratic leadership that Nigeria needs in this day and age to take her to an expected position to lead not only Africa but the world. Currently as it is, Nigeria CANNOT even lead herself!!!
Since 1999 to date there has been no governor or House of Representative member under the age of 35. 98.9% of governors and ministers today are over 35. The closest Nigeria gave the youth an opportunity to the exalted office of Governor and Members House of Representatives was in 1992 when under the SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY (SDP) Ali Sa’ad Birnin-kudu ran and won election to become Governor of Jigawa state at 31. And some of us, I inclusive, ran and won election to the House of Representatives at age 31. Though the youth still make up the largest demographics, young people are regrettably underrepresented among the candidates on the ballot. I believe that for young people to view politics as deserving and worthwhile, they must be inspired about its credibility, legitimacy and sanctity.
Political reforms must be empirical to motivate youth interaction with established political systems. This system must include responsive political processes institutionalized to engender trust that the youth would not be shortchanged through unnecessary bottlenecks to deny them political space for expected social change. Older politicians who control political parties through the use of godfatherism, moneybag exploits and lack of internal party democracy must be clearly seen not to be a stumbling block to the new ethos.
Government should offer a viable avenue for genuine political participation and assimilation of young people into elected positions and appointments. A point of note for instance is the cost of buying nomination forms. This should NOT be prohibitive else it would put a death nail to young people’s desire to participate in the leadership recruitment process which oftentimes throws in the worst instead of the best based on financial capacity and not leadership qualities and integrity.
It is important to emphasize the necessity of staying attuned to the evolving nature of political engagement and tailoring programs to effectively resonate with current generation and global best practices. The emphasis on strategic, adaptable and trend-aligned engagement programs reflects a thoughtful approach to addressing the evolving dynamics of youth involvement in shaping future leadership/governance. I advise political party YOUTH LEADERS in different political parties to seek for rejuvenated youth engagement programs that align with contemporary trends in youth leadership and political activism.
In a country with a culture of political rascality with very weak institutions and structures for political accountability, calling out the youth for leadership from a transformational perspective may be daunting. In the last 23 years of Nigeria’s return to democratic rule, we seem to have experienced a rather very disturbing retrogression than expected progress with expected outcomes.
From 1999 to date when the Peoples Democratic Party took the mantle of state and ran affairs of governance for 16 years, we witnessed a gradual rise in youth activism which brought in a political class that seemed vibrant but the vibrancy couldn’t be sustained for long.
We saw the rise of youthful governors raising a rather subservient youth group loyal to them whom they emboldened to perpetrate their wishes in flagrant disregard to constitutional provisions. Any opposition to such abuses were categorized as disloyalty to the governor and such identified individuals were marked as political dissidents who must not benefit from any democratic dividends. This led to cultic followership at the behest of whoever wielded political patronage whether at the presidential, gubernatorial, ministerial, national assembly or local government level. Out of these cultic ensembles emerged future anointed for take-over bids as governors or deputies as the case maybe, ministers, national and state assembly members and local government chairmen as well as board appointments at the federal, state and local governments. We began to see a gradual deliberate ceding of individual rights of the youth to the governors and president and whoever represented the executive arm of government at different levels.
This led to the demonization of the vibrant Nigerian youth whose survival instincts thought him better to remain subjugated in order to be anointed to climb the political ladder tomorrow or be propelled into the money bag class of juicy government contracts to “maintain”. At this level of “maintaining” the youth got so psychologically disemboweled that it became impossible sometimes to know who was real amongst them or not in in order to channel constructive criticism of their principals. These “maintaining” army got so debased that they formed a barricade that shields their principals from critique that could help them sincerely analyze their performance and indeed give proper account of their stewardship in office. This political barricade is indeed the real problem in this era from my experience because these youths are the ears, eyes and hands of their principals. Truth is that these privileged youths fashion out tales that castigate well-meaning critique and replace with sycophantic narratives that further alienates their principals from the reality on ground. I call this group of youths AHITOPHEL’S BRIGADE. Their tentacles spread beyond imagination while their main motivation is to leech on the political office holder for an opportunity to be anointed for take-over or for a particular desired goal.
Through these Ahithophel’s Brigade comes next the conduits who are either lobbyists or contractors who in most cases are friends or associates of the brigade. They cook up contracts sometimes in connivance with party stalwarts and ram down throats of commissioners and permanent secretaries for jobs that most often than not end up as abandoned projects because they were hastily and politically conceived and executed hence the ever increasing corruption network whose web spirals from local government to federally executed jobs that have continued to drain effective service delivery nationwide.
It is important to note this interest group I call AHITOPHEL’S BRIGADE. They are usually trusted to be MOST loyal to their principals. MOST trusted as the ear and eye of their principal. They can and always shield their principal for good or bad to a large extent for their interest and in most cases, they come out as fat cows of the administration with no trace of evil attributed to them whilst they reap their ill-gotten wealth amassed from their vicarious contributions to bad governance and unimaginable stealing of public wealth.
While preparing this speech, I tried to take a cursory look at the overall index of the Nigerian youth for the past 23 years. My overall rating of the Nigerian youth is quite high irrespective of obvious misadventure. The Nigerian youth has emerged as the Volkswagen Beatle Car advert of the late 70s and 80s (there’s no killing the Beatle) The Volkswagen Beatle Car came under intense competition from Peugeot Automobile which had just set up an assembly plant and started rolling out seemingly more luxurious Peugeot brands of the 404 and 504 models that literarily made the Volkswagen Beatle car less attractive and relegated same.
The psyche of political office with attendant opportunities of quick wealth, influence and opportunities, the Nigerian youth was suddenly thrust into a survival mode that made exclusion from the list of the successful not a consideration for any reason.
This phase also unleashed youthful energy that ballooned the Nigerian youth from obscurity to global visibility in every sphere of endeavor. The Nigerian youth easily excelled in the arts taking music and the film industry by storm. The world stood still as the Nigerian youth conquered the stage with afro-beat rhythm that I believe made Fela Anikulapo Kuti rejoice in his grave for his pioneering effort at establishing a truly African genre that is unadulterated by western influence. They made Nigeria so proud with their unique instrumentation and subtle cultural infusions that western cultures that got inebriated by the new musical emancipation of the Nigerian brand couldn’t and till date don’t understand the storm that is blowing from Nigeria across the globe with rhythm and lyrics that erstwhile was categorized as native, satanic and barbaric!!!
At the same time, Nollywood emerged with a vibrancy that Bollywood which was next to Hollywood gave a bow for the Nigerian film industry to take a 2nd place globally!!!
In the field of sports Nigerian youths have wowed the world with fantastic soccer stars like JJ Okocha, Kanu Nwankwo, Mikel Obi etc. the Nigerian youth hasn’t failed even in culinary prowess as we recently witnessed Hilda Bassey (Baci) enter the Guinness Book of Records as winner of 93 hours of cooking!!! The list is endless.
The Nigerian youths that “jakpaad” have excelled in almost every field of endeavor in their countries of abode be it sports, law, medicine, architecture, art, music, boxing, whatever. And the sweet thing about them is the patriotism of lifting the Nigerian flag or carrying the Nigerian identification whenever they exceled!!
The Nigerian youth did not disappoint in the negative either. With the entrance of the millennials and Gen Zs, the Nigerian youth took internet scams to another level where “stars” like Hush Puppi who was sentenced to 11 years imprisonment for conspiracy to launder money obtained from business email compromise and other scams made over 60 million dollars in various exploits and one Emmanuel Nwude who mesmerized the banking world by selling a non-existent airport in Nigeria to a Brazilian bank for $242 million.
With above few examples, there is no gainsaying the fact that the Nigerian youth has shown remarkable ability to adapt to new circumstances in every sphere.
Where the political space threw them out, they found other avenues in their survival mode to be on top of their game.
In the last 23 years of Nigeria’s 4th return to democratic governance, it would not be wrong to state that we have come to a very dark moment of our 23 years walk on this pathway of democracy and certain things must necessarily be rejigged.
As the CONVENER OF COUNTRYFIRST MOVEMENT Prof. Chris Nwaokobia Mustapha Jnr Succinctly puts it, I quote
“Imo, Kogi and Bayelsa Off Season Elections, why expect fairness and peace when Snatch and Run with it is in the Saddle? I’m beginning to believe that we suffer from gross selective amnesia as a nation. I have read befuddling wistfulness manifest in many commentaries about possible free, fair and credible polls in Bayelsa, Kogi and Imo. And I wonder whodunit. Are you not aware that the morning tells largely what the day would be like. With the electoral larceny of February and March 2023, and the attendant judiciary summersaults, tell me who believes in the sanctity and sanity of the electoral process anymore? Who will wait for a sullied, tainted and corrupt umpire, in this case Mahmood Yakubu’s INEC to declare results without doing the untoward? Does the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC have the capacity to organize a “free, fair and credible election? The truth is that the floodgates of blood have been unlocked in Bayelsa, Kogi and Imo because the man who must win must understand that “power is not served ala’carte, he must snatch it, run with it and where necessary, kill for it. That is where we are. If you like, call me a sore loser for telling the truth, call me a grieving obedient, but can you sow cassava and reap cocoa yam? I can bet the heavens that a million battalions cannot maintain peace in the Off Season elections scheduled for 11th November 2023 in the states of Bayelsa, Kogi and Imo. Speaking deeply, the polls are scheduled by the umpire INEC and the President, to be theatres of blood. I pray they prove me wrong; I pray. But how can they when those who hailed the violence that greeted the February and March national elections occupy prized positions in government today. How can they when “Go to court” is the new cliché in town. Must you not win by any means possible and through any crookedness available for the looser to “Go to court”? a thousand and one pages of signed Peace Accords will pass for toilet sheets if nothing is done quickly to recalibrate our moral margins and redefine the frontiers of politics and electioneering in Nigeria. Anything else is like the “Wait for Godot”.
After spending over N320b in the sham called elections that Mahmood Yakubu and his goons superintended over in February and March, and no one is yet on trial for several inexplicable hitches, glitches and ditches. After watching the dance macabre that the judiciary gave a clean bill to. And after seeing “Go to Court” mean “We own the Courts”. What do you expect will happen in Imo, Kogi and Bayelsa? You are not a Clairvoyant, nor are you a Nostradamus if you say, sorrow, tears, blood and mayhem. But wait, must this mess continue ad nauseam ad infinitum?
It is however not all doom and gloom, countrymen and women, the present crisis shall most definitely make true time-tested praxis “only when its dark enough can you see the stars”. Something must give sooner rather than later, and then the task of nation building shall begin. Here you may call me Clairvoyant, you may call me a Seer, or even call me Nostradamus, but like Carlyle I believe that NO LIE CAN LIVE FOREVER, I like Cullen William Bryant I believe that TRUTH CRUSHED TO EARTH SHALL RISE AGAIN, and I believe that a new Nigeria is in the horizon.
My faith in God tells me that Nigeria shall rise again. My faith in Nigeria tells me that a New Generation of Patriots and Thinkers are ready, willing and able to berth the New Day, the New Deal and the New Republic that we crave. And my faith in humankind says keep the fire burning Chris, for the day is near.”
LIMITATIONS OF YOUTH PARTICIPATION IN BEING VANGUARD OF SOCIAL JUSTICE
Let’s look at few likely limitations for the youth to be the vanguard of promoting social change:
- Level of Education: the disparity in educational backgrounds is a big disadvantage. The understanding of issues from broad spectrum and for necessary input to proffer correct methodology for channeling identified issues to be mitigated is a challenge. This leaves a wide vacuum for good issues of social change to be hijacked or easily thwarted by outside interests.
- Political Ideology: The Nigerian youth has no clear cut political ideology with which to follow outside student unionism with bombastic lingo which may best be confined to their campuses but may not have any real bearing with the larger society which they are expected to intervene. Nigeria hasn’t really offered them through existing political parties or leadership precise political ideologies with which to base their expectations and or interventions. The last time political parties had any real attempt at ideological perspective was the coinage of the Gen. Babangida’s “a little to the left and a little to the right” SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY & NATIONAL REPUBLICAN CONVENTION of 1989 which produced MKO Abiola of (SDP) as winner of the Presidency but could not see him sworn in as President. He rather died under mysterious circumstances which have not been unraveled till date.
The Nigerian youth is confused as to what political ideology to advocate not knowing what brand of democracy is practiced in Nigeria. They see a mixture of a badly plagiarized American Presidential System laced with a comic cocktail of Theocracy, Monarchy and Oligarchy in some parts of northern Nigeria while certain individuals bestriding as governors in Southern Nigeria practice Dictatorship, Autocracy and Authoritarianism in their states where they reign as imperial majesties in absolute disregard of a binding Federal state!!! To worsen the matter for the confused youths, the Judiciary has not helped in playing the role of the ombudsman for the youth to have a direction towards collating and channeling his expectations of governance in social and political activism.
WHAT CAN THE YOUTH DO?
DO SOMETHING!!!
(2. Kg 7:4) If we say, we will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there: and if we sit still here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us fall unto the host of the Syrians: if they save us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die
- VISION: The Nigerian youth must put on a new lens through which he must see himself, his worth, his peculiar advantage and his unique contribution in the political space. Infact the Nigerian youth is the back upon which all political actors ride. Truth is, the Nigerian society as is, thrives because the youth is ignorant of his worth and has not placed the right value upon himself. The youth is unaware of his enormous potential. Because of his ignorance, the Executive exploits him. Because of his ignorance the Legislature exploits him. Because of his ignorance the Judiciary exploits him!!! Yet the youth is the proverbial table upon which the political actors place their meals. When he eventually realizes this, he will rise up and throw away their meals and ensure the right premium is placed on him.
The Nigerian youth must recognize the enormous role he plays in transformation and place a premium on his contribution. The more upright he is, the easier it is for him to market and sell his worth. The perception of his integrity quotient or character deficiency is what places a premium on his worth.
- The youth must map out clearly identified and well thought-out transformative issues for which to impact society through specific outcomes. The youth must engage in various forms of civic and social actions as volunteering, campaigning, organizing, mobilizing, protesting, or advocating for causes or issues that they care about. These actions can help the youth express their opinions, values and identities to raise awareness and influence public opinion to hold authorities accountable and to create positive change and impact in their communities and societies. For example, the END SARS PROJECT. Its planning, execution and expected outcomes need to become a case study for youth participation in political transformation. The aim of the #ENDSARS# was to stop police brutality and its profiling of innocent youths. Demonstration in the streets was NOT the expected outcome. Demonstration was just a tool to direct attention towards expected policy change. The avenues for which that outcome was expected was far wider than just one medium which left the PROJECT with question marks at the end as to whether the purpose was achieved.
Compare the #END SARS# Project with the MALALA YOUSAFZ’S campaign for “THE RIGHT FOR EVERY CHILD TO RECEIVE EDUCATION” in Pakistan. With the right coordination and networking, even though lives were lost under the Taliban onslaught against the campaign and Malala almost lost her life, the aim was achieved. International pressure led to the achievement of the expected outcomes. Malala through this campaign became a Nobel Laurette at age 17!!! She is 26 today. On the flip side, the #ENDSARS# Project ended without expected outcomes so to speak, ended with unsung martyrs, ended without global intervention and ended without identified heroes. And even those who are keeping the fire of the endeavor alive today with hash tags, are quite negligible and literarily drowning in attempting to keep the fire of the endeavor alive! Not even the “OBEDIENTS” identified with Mr. Peter Obi, Presidential Candidate of the Labor Party in the February 11th Presidential elections could sustain the empathy evoked by the #ENDSARS# crusade.
Examples abound to learn from other climes where youth advocacies have led to expected outcomes like, the Scottish Independence Referendum, The Columbian Peace Referendum, The Sudanese Revolution and the Hong Kong protests amongst others.
- With the advent of social media, there are more subtle, persuasive and pungent avenues with which to market social change issues with hash tags and buy-ins that are non-violent and generic.
- Funding could be tricky in some of these issues based campaigns but with strategic networking that encourages “buy-ins”, crowdfunding can always come in handy amongst other fundraising strategies as the case maybe. But it must be seen and known to be owned and driven by the youth to evoke expected empathy.
- All political parties have offices of YOUTH LEADER. These offices can drive the enthusiasm, passion and energy of the youth using participatory methods that bring out the best potential in the youth for transformation.
- Faith based, tribal and ethnic issues that have held the Nigerian state politically captive are veritable content that youth activism can deploy to canvass for transformation amongst others.
- It is time for the Nigerian youth to stop looking at elders who told them they are leaders of tomorrow to recognize now that those leaders are rather depending on them youths to rescue them from a ship they elders have literarily run aground. The youth must stop playing the victim and leverage on their God-given energy and see beyond the limiting circumstances around their immediate environment and deploy their natural gifting and talent for the good of society.
Finally, you are not here for pep talk. You are here to braze up and take up the challenge of refocusing Nigeria’s priorities, her image and her perception to prepare her to face her leadership role in the African continent. You are up against a global narrative which was very well adumbrated by the current national security adviser Nuhu Ribadu who before a global audience told the world that “I am a Nigerian, I am from this paradoxical continent where today our most notorious export is stolen money”.
This is your time and space. If a Gen Z Uyai Abasi recently in Akwa Ibom Tech week displayed her invention named IFIOK an AI phone that is 100% voice controlled without a physical screen enabled with accurate location tracker, lie detector and much more capabilities than your regular android and iOS phones, you can be sure the world is actually in for a shock from the Nigerian youth. I posted IFIOK on my personal Facebook handle.
This conference is to help sharpen your knack for political activism for transformational change and assist in contributing towards helping you achieve that purpose. There are quite a couple of topics that can appeal to wider interests that you could adopt ranging from “Removal of immunity clause for all public office holders”, affordable qualitative education for all, quality health care for rural communities, Electricity for all, Security for all, affordable housing for all, LGBT etc.
I am here to challenge you to learn a skill that can help you earn and be financially independent of pittance politicians give to you during campaigns so you can conveniently participate in the political process as candidates or influencers. There are myriads of skills available at little or no cost at all. From copy writing to video editing, email marketing, high ticket sales closing and many others that can make you content creators with high earning without compromising your integrity!!! Fela in one of his famous interviews remarked, “I hold ganja saying the truth. But they hold the holy book and tell lies”. That is the problem the youth face today not knowing where salvation will come from whether from the holy book or from the smelly king’s table.
Never has Nigeria been so blessed in history as now, with Nigerians heading the biggest African financial institutions, (African Development Bank, African Export-Import Bank (Afriexim) and African Finance Corporation. The African Export-Import Bank (Afri-exim) just hosted an Africa Intra-Trade fair in Cairo Egypt with enormous potentials which could be leveraged upon for strategic political mileage for youth activism. This advantage can be leveraged with what the World Trade Organization (WTO)Nigeria’s Ngozi Okonji-Iweala is doing as the head of that organization
FROM NIGERIAN YOUTHS TO THE WORLD.
I would want the Nigerian youth arising from this conference to send a distinct and clear message to the world. Telling the world that though our own former President, Gen. Mohammadu Buhari called us lazy and jobless because he could not recognize nor understand our potential, we will not wait nor beg to be recognized for what we can give to the world. Though we may have been labelled scammers, on the world wide web, we are resolved to change that narrative to reflect us as the ones who sanitized the internet space with our positive contributions. Though we may face infrastructural deficits to accomplish our ideas, we rest assured following the resilience of our examples in Chimamanda Oduche, Hilda Baci, Faith Odunsi, the 15 year old girl who represented Nigeria at the Global Mathematics competition in China beating the United States, United Kingdom, China and the rest of the world to bring the trophy to Nigeria. Faith Odunsi’s doggedness, resilience and determination to prove to the world that living and schooling in Nigeria was an advantage and not otherwise, proved that hard work and God’s grace which is abundant in Nigeria, a country sustained by grace and absolute confidence in God and His creation of male and female is still very much superintending in the affairs of man and has designated Nigeria as leader of the African continent and the next global hub through the effort of the youth which we are in the vanguard.
I want the Nigerian youth to rise from this conference determined that though generations before you may not have lifted you to leadership examples worthy of note, your generation will right the wrongs.
I want the Nigerian youth to rise from this conference determined not to hold a pity party and beg for validation but rather determined to utilize all you have heard in this conference as a catalyst for your metamorphosis. I want the Nigerian youth to understand that the leadership of tomorrow you were promised yesterday has become available today, unfortunately without the promise. You have been left with the most unenviable task of navigating Nigeria out of this present darkness to a future designed and created by you!!! Fortunately, the International Organization For Peace Building And Social Justice has confidence in you and believes you will succeed and birth a new Nigeria of our dreams. May God help you!!!
Thank you.
