By Omeiza Ajayi
ABUJA: Youths of the ruling All Progressives Congress APC, have called on President Bola Tinubu and APC governors to embrace inclusivity in governance and accord them more recognition, while pledging to deliver 10 million votes for the president’s 2027 second-term ambition.
Speaking under the aegis of Youths on Ground Progressive and Mentorship Initiative YOG, National Coordinator of the group Dr Obioma Nwuba, said they are founded against the pattern of youths being summoned into politics only as thugs or ballot-box protectors, only to be discarded after elections, stressing that his organisation was instead building a disciplined structure of purposeful leadership in which young Nigerians are trained, organised and positioned as genuine stakeholders in governance.
Nwuba then turned to his call on the federal government and APC governors, insisting that hope cannot be renewed from Abuja alone but must be delivered in Abuja, Awka and Owo, and felt on the farm in Jalingo and the workshop in Benin. He urged the federal government and APC governors to recognise, endorse and partner with YOG as the grassroots delivery arm of the Renewed Hope Agenda, telling the president directly, “Mr President, you have given us the vision. Give us the vehicle. YOG is that vehicle, tested, structured, and already on the ground.”
He told the governors that the group was not asking for handouts but offering foot soldiers for food security, peace and jobs in their states, urging them to integrate YOG into their job and agriculture schemes without delay. “The time for youth conferences is over. The time for youth contracts is now,” he said, adding that every youth left idle is a risk while every youth trained is an asset.
He said the group’s Agro-Tech and skills acquisition programmes should be integrated with federal and state job-creation and food-security schemes, and that its mobilisation structures be engaged as the legitimate, organised channel through which government policy reaches the grassroots, describing the arrangement as a necessity rather than a favour.
According to him, YOG was formally established in August 2025 as a purpose-driven vehicle for youth mobilisation, mentorship and grassroots empowerment across the country, anchored on the conviction that Nigeria’s youths, who make up over 70 per cent of the population under the age of thirty, must move from the margins of governance to the centre of nation-building.
He recalled that the group announced itself on the national stage on 22nd November 2025 at the South-East Youth Summit held at the Oakland Centre, Enugu State, which he called a declaration that Nigerian youths are ready to be organised, mentored and counted as partners rather than spectators in the Renewed Hope project.
Nwuba listed the four strategic pillars of the initiative as youth participation in governance and civic engagement, policy advocacy, community-centred peacebuilding, and economic empowerment.
According to him, YOG exists to complement and amplify Tinubu’s commitment to youth empowerment, economic revitalisation and national stability, aligning its grassroots activities directly with the president’s Eight-Point Agenda. He said where the Renewed Hope Agenda speaks of food security, the group is already on the farms training young agropreneurs, and where it speaks of job creation, it is already building mentorship pipelines, adding that government policy succeeds or fails at the point of delivery, which he identified as the community.
Highlighting the group’s activities within its first year of existence, Nwuba listed the South-East Youth Summit in Enugu on 22nd November 2025, an Agro-Tech Training, Mentorship and Empowerment Programme in Jalingo, Taraba State, on 18th February 2026, and a free malaria and typhoid fever eradication programme in the Federal Capital Territory FCT on 13th March 2026 that reached over 500 beneficiaries. He also cited a similar Agro-Tech programme held in Minna, Niger State, on 2nd May 2026, a malaria and typhoid eradication exercise scheduled for Anambra State on 24th and 25th August 2026, and an Agro-Tech programme for the entire Northwest zone billed for Kaduna State on 5th September 2026.
Speaking on Nigeria’s youth demography, Nwuba described the country’s youth population, with a median age below eighteen years, as either the nation’s greatest asset or its greatest risk. He said ten million positive-minded youths, united by structure, mentorship and shared purpose, represent a force capable of stabilising Nigeria’s democracy and driving economic revival, noting that the group is deliberately building across all six geopolitical zones because a young Igbo agropreneur, a young Tarok mentee, and a young beneficiary from Kano are, in the eyes of YOG, simply young Nigerians.
