By Ibraheem Solaudeen
The north central caucus of the All Progressives Youth Forum (APYF) has called on the incoming governors in the zone to take as priority the need to involve more young people in governance in order to achieve an appreciable level of youth representation in government.
The north central coordinator of the Forum, Mallam Mohammed Abdullahi made the call yesterday in Ilorin, the Kwara state capital, while speaking to journalists on the prospects of the incoming administration of Alhaji Abdulrahman Abdulrazak.
Abdullahi noted that young people have been denied the chance to contribute ideas to nation building, a situation he said prevented the country from tapping from the high resourcefulness of youths.
“We’re all familiar with the statistics of youth population in this country. It’s often between 60 to 70 percent in most states, and even higher in some. But when you look around, you discover that most state governors have stifled the chances of this significant demography to have any appreciable level of representation in governance. My hope is that the new set of governors coming onboard will see the need to reverse this trend by engaging young people to play the sort of innovative roles expected of them.”
Abdullahi, who was recently elected the Chairman of Forum of APYF State Coordinators, also spoke about the efforts being made by his colleagues in other states to push the issue of youth representation to the front burner of political discourse.
“I can tell you that the political family to which I belong, that is APYF, is one that is very serious about this issue of youth inclusion. Just a couple of weeks ago, we met in Abuja where the national leadership of the group briefed the state coordinators on the efforts they are making to ensure youths secure a space on the political table. Of course, our state coordinators are also making frantic efforts to promote this issue and get relevant stakeholders to back them up.”
Asked if he thought that being young is enough criteria to bring youth into governance, Abdullahi said that he was sure that Nigeria is “blessed with a large enough number of resourceful people who also have the added advantage of being young”. He said as far as his political group is concerned, they are not asking for inclusion on the basis of youthfulness but on account of the quality of membership they possess which, according to him, “represents a compelling mix of innovation, creativity and competence”.