Any keen observer of social media spaces ahead of Nigeria’s upcoming presidential election cannot be in any doubt about the power that young people have to dictate the direction of national political discourse. Thanks to social media savvy young people, what started as a two-horse race is now incontrovertibly a three-horse race with all eyes on Peter Gregory Obi the once distant third-horse candidate of the Labour Party who now dominates the election discourse on all major media platforms.
With the meteoric rise of Peter Obi (age 61), one is left to wonder what the outcome would be if that same youth had devoted their efforts to promoting the presidential ambition of someone within their own age group?
Not Too Young To Run
Led by the Youth Action Initiative Africa (YIAGA), a coalition of about 40 youth-based and youth-led Nigerian civil society organisations mobilised support for the Not Too Young To Run campaign in 2016, a movement devoted to increasing the capacity of young Nigerians to participate in formal political spaces. The campaign led to the Not Too Young To Run Act of 2018.
The new act reduced the age a citizen could run for president from 40 years old to 35. Following this, current President Muhammadu Buhari jovially pleaded with the Nigerian youth to delay their presidential ambition until after he had won and completed his second term in office. Almost as though in acceptance of President Muhammadu Buhari’s plea, Nigerians re-elected him in 2019 for another four years while the new law awaits its time.
However, four years later, this time has yet to come. The youngest among the three frontrunner candidates in today’s race to lead Nigeria is a 61-year-old politician discursively reimagining himself as the youthful candidate. Peter Obi positioning himself as the candidate for youth is surprising given that the ages of the other two major candidates, one disputably 70 and one 76.
’Youth’ is of course a fluid category, changing from culture to culture and without any universally agreed upon age boundaries. For example, Nigeria’s National Youth Policy 2019 revised the age bracket of youth from 18 – 35 years to 15 – 29 years old. Whether at 29 or 35, will Nigerian youth anytime soon possess what it takes to mobilise the support for a young person to become President?
Until a few months ago, the 61-year-old Peter Obi, a two-term former Governor of Anambra State was quite indistinguishable from the other candidates running for election. Their political capital derives largely from belonging to the political establishment and possessing access to financial resources. Like others, Peter Obi moved from the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on whose platform he ran in 2019 as the running mate of the presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar.
He is now running on the platform of the Labour Party, having decamped from the PDP when he realised that his chances were slim at the party’s primary election. It is noteworthy that Peter Obi is also a billionaire businessman of repute, who has houses in rich neighbourhoods of Lagos and London. He is not a newcomer to wealth, as he bought his properties before he became a governor in 2006.
Social media movements
There are two major visible forces behind Peter Obi candidacy’s takeover of the Nigerian digital media space: the former #BringBackOurGirls (BBOG) activists; and the #EndSARS protesters. Although disparate in focus, what the BBOG activists and the #EndSARS protesters have in common is leading globally acknowledged social media campaigns against the failure of governments in power.
Starting in 2014 in response to the abduction of the 276 Chibok schoolgirls in Nigeria, the BBOG movement was at the forefront of holding the Goodluck Jonathan presidency accountable on the abduction and similar abductions that also occurred. Although its members were physically attacked by hoodlums and security operatives many times, the movement kept the abduction and similar government failures in the global consciousness for a number of years.
Like the BBOG activists, the #EndSARS protesters emerged out of a youth-led action against police brutality. On the 20 October 2020, at the Lekki Toll Plaza in Lagos, the mostly youth led peaceful protesters against police brutality then had that same brutality meted out on them, leaving them promising to institute a youth-led political order in Nigeria come the 2023 general elections. Unexpectedly, sixteen months after this, the same #EndSARS protesters queued up behind one of the politicians they swore never to vote for again.
By demography, the Nigerian youth have what it takes to win the presidency. Out of the 93,469,008 eligible voters in the country’s voter register, 37,060,399 (39.65 per cent) are aged between 18 and 34 while 33,413,591 (35.75 per cent) are aged between 35 and 49. These statistics place the three frontrunners in the presidential race in the same age bracket as just 24.60 per cent of voters. But whether in Nigeria or elsewhere, elections is not won by age alone.
In Nigeria, it takes more than just access to disposable wealth and belonging to the political elite class to win a major election. Winning such an election, especially for an unpopular candidate like Goodluck Jonathan in 2011 or an opposition candidate like Muhammadu Buhari in 2015, requires an ability to turn opponent’s failures into campaign promises.
Peter Obi has done all these or rather had them done excellently well for him by the Nigerian youth who crave a change different from that which President Muhammadu Buhari promised in 2015. But would any young person without the credentials of Peter Obi have stood any chance in a race headlined by Bola Tinubu and Atiku Abubakar, even if that young person enjoyed the support of other youth across the country? The likelihood is low.
Ideas into actions
While the current political situation remains the closest that Nigerian youth can get to the office of the president is as forces behind elite politicians who can own the ideals of young people as though they (the ideals) belonged to the politicians. That is what is contextually realisable for now, even though there is no guarantee that it will be a better alternative. If he wins, Peter Obi would be a president of the Nigerian youth’s making. However, for him to be a president representing the interests of the youth, young people must not go to sleep after his victory. They must ensure that he does not enjoy popular applause for unpopular decisions and unjustifiable inactions like President Muhammadu Buhari has done for almost eight years.
The development in the Nigerian political space confirms the fact that new laws and policies are not enough to ensure an inclusive democracy. Contextual realities have rolled back the gains of the Not Too Young to Run law which expands young people’s opportunities to run for elective offices. It will take revolutionary leadership to address those contextual factors. That type of revolutionary leadership is what many Nigerian youth hope to have in Peter Obi’s presidency should he win the February 25 election.
Oyewole Oladapo is an academic working in the Department of Communication and Language Arts, University of Ibadan, Nigeria. He is a member of the IDS-convened African Digital Rights Network and co-authored the Nigeria Digital Rights Landscape Report as part of the Digital Rights in Closing Civic Space: Lessons from Ten African Countries report.
