There is a conversation happening in every corner of Nigeria — in Lagos traffic, on Abuja streets, in the markets of Aba and Onitsha, and in the lecture halls of Zaria and Uyo. It is a conversation carried in sighs more than sentences. Young Nigerians — the most connected, educated, and restless generation this country has ever produced — are watching a political system that seems designed to exclude them, and they are asking the same exhausted question: What is the point?
That question deserves a serious answer. Not a slogan. Not a campaign promise. A serious, honest answer.
Where We Are
Nigeria is, demographically, a young country. Over 70 percent of our population is under 35. We are not the minority, we are the majority. And yet, the average age of a Nigerian senator hovers close to 60. Governorship seats, federal ministries, and party leadership structures remain the preserve of men and women old enough to remember the Second Republic. The Not Too Young To Run Act of 2018 was celebrated as a breakthrough, and it was, but legislation alone does not dismantle the gatekeeping that money, godfatherism networks, and decades of political entrenchment have built.
The painful truth is that Nigerian politics has made itself expensive by design. Running for a House of Representatives seat in most states requires funds that would dwarf the lifetime earnings of the average young graduate. Party nomination forms, campaign logistics, and the informal "settlement" culture at every level conspire to ensure that only those already inside the system, or backed by those who can hope to enter it. Young people are not absent from Nigerian politics because they do not care. They are largely absent because the structure was not built with them in mind.
Adding to this is a crisis of trust. A generation that grew up watching treasury looting, inconclusive elections, and recycled faces cannot be blamed for its cynicism. When voting produces no visible change, disengagement looks less like apathy and more like rational self-preservation.
Why We Must Get Involved Anyway
Here is the dangerous irony of political disengagement: the less young people participate, the more the system calcifies around those who do. Absence is not neutrality — it is a vote for the status quo.
The decisions made in government offices today — on education funding, healthcare, economic diversification, security, digital infrastructure — will shape the Nigeria that young people will live and raise their own children in. Those decisions are being made right now, often without a single young voice in the room. Every budget passed without youth input, every policy designed without youth consultation, every appointment made without youth representation is a debt that our generation will spend decades repaying.
But beyond self-interest, there is something larger at stake. Nigeria is at a crossroads that history will record. The country sits on extraordinary human capital — millions of young entrepreneurs, technologists, creatives, and thinkers who are already solving problems at the grassroots level, often in spite of government, not because of it. Imagine what becomes possible when that energy enters governance itself.
There is also the question of what is already changing. Across Nigerian states, younger faces are beginning to appear — not in the numbers needed, but as proof of possibility. The ARISE Agenda in Akwa Ibom, economic reforms at the federal level, and the growing sophistication of civic technology and digital advocacy show that governance can be reimagined. Young people who engage are not walking into a dead end. They are building a new corridor.
The Way Forward
The path forward is not one road. It is many, and young Nigerians must walk all of them simultaneously.
Firstly, we must redefine what political participation means. Running for office is one form of engagement, but it is not the only one. Policy advocacy, digital organizing, civic education, community mobilization, and holding elected officials accountable through data and documentation are all forms of political power. Young people who master these tools are already governing, whether or not they hold a title.
Secondly, we must build structures, not just moments. The #EndSARS movement of 2020 demonstrated, brilliantly and painfully, that young Nigerians can mobilize at scale. What it also revealed is that mobilization without institutional architecture is vulnerable. The energy generated on the streets and on Twitter dissipated, in part, because there were no structures to channel it into sustained political power. The next chapter must be about building those structures — youth-led political organizations, policy think tanks, ward-level civic councils that convert energy into durable influence.
Thirdly, we must engage local government seriously. Much of what affects ordinary Nigerian life — primary healthcare, school maintenance, market infrastructure are managed or neglected at the local government level. Yet local government elections attract the least youth attention. This is a strategic blind spot. Those who master local governance build the platform from which state and federal relevance grows.
Fourthly, we must use technology as a force multiplier. Digital advocacy is not a substitute for ground-level organizing, but it is an extraordinary amplifier. Social media, data journalism, digital petition platforms, and community apps are tools that young Nigerians already understand better than any generation before them. Deploying them with political intentionality, not just outrage, but strategy, can shift conversations, hold power accountable, and build constituencies.
Finally, WE MUST RUN. Despite every structural obstacle, young Nigerians must contest for office — starting at the lowest rung and climbing deliberately. One term on a local government council builds the name recognition, the networks, and the institutional knowledge that future campaigns require. The system will not self-reform. It will only change when enough new people enter it and refuse to be absorbed by its worst traditions.
The Stakes
Nigeria's future is not being written in some distant place by some unknowable hand. It is being written now, in budgets and bills and appointments and elections. The question is not whether young Nigerians will shape that future. The question is whether they will choose to.
The clock is ticking. The seats at the table are not going to remain empty forever — they will be filled, one way or another. The only choice is who fills them.
It should be us. IT MUST BE US.