IT is no longer news that the South American country, Chile, has a new president. Gabriel Boric, 35, ran against the right wing and politically much more experienced candidate, Jose Antonio Kast, and recorded a tidy win. As the millennial takes over the reins in the 19.359 million-strong isolated country surrounded by mountains and with more than 6,000km of Pacific Ocean coastline, he will have a long list of hurdles, including a divided parliament and economic downturns, to contend with. Shortly after casting his vote in his native Punta Arenas, Boric, a socialist and populist, gave ample indication of his rather woke personality when he said: “We are a new generation that is entering politics with clean hands, a warm heart and a cool head. We are sure that we will make Chile more human, decent and egalitarian.”
We congratulate the president-elect on his historic win and wish him great success. Of a truth, young people are being given the opportunity to prove their mettle globally. Emmanuel Macron, the French president, is only 44, and he has been in the saddle for four years. Sanna Marin, Prime Minister of Finland since 1999, is 36. Nayib Bukele, president of El Salvador, is 40, while Irakli Garibashvili, Prime Minister of Georgia, is 39. We can go on and on but on this score, the contrast between the listed countries and Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, couldn’t be more stark at the moment. Nigeria’s current president, Muhammadu Buhari, is 79, and none of the aspirants who have shown interest in the 2023 presidential race in the major parties is a youth. And, what is more, except by a dramatic turn of events, Nigeria is not likely to get a young president in 2023.
The foregoing should, however, not lead to the conclusion that Nigeria’s crooked leadership recruitment process, skewed against young and old, especially people with great ideas, somehow precludes young people from occupying office. The fact is that young people, from independence till the moment, have always had the opportunity to rule. This was the case even under the military. For instance, General Yakubu Gowon was a young bachelor when he became Head of State, and his military successors, including Generals Murtala Muhammed and Olusegun Obasanjo, were all young men. Indeed, as military administrators, a number of those who ruled the states between 1966 and 1979 were barely 35.
Instructively, the pattern did not significantly change with the return to civil rule in 1999. Governors such as Orji Uzor Kalu, James Ibori, Lucky Igbinedion, Donald Duke, Boni Haruna and Joshua Dariye were young men when they were elected. Former Speaker Dimeji Bankole became Nigeria’s Number Four citizen at 37 and even now, there are young people at all levels of governance. The 2019 general election produced some young Speakers of Houses of Assembly, including the 39-year-old Aminu Abdullahi Shagali of Kaduna State, Nasiru Magarya (31, Zamfara State); Abok Nuhu Ayuba (33, Plateau State), Adebo Ogundoyin, (32, Oyo State), and Salihu Yakubu Danladi (34, Kwara State).
Although young people are not precluded from the highest positions in Nigeria’s politics, it is still a fact that the process producing them and other so-called leaders is severely defective. As Nigerians have come to discover to their chagrin, there are no political parties properly so-called in the country, but mechanisms for capturing power. In any case, quite a number of those managing affairs at all levels see the essence of politics as the pursuit of power, and frown on the allocation of resources for the public good. It is a fact that none of the major parties that the country is currently afflicted with operates a membership register. The parties and their operations are heavily monetised and are effectively owned by the noveau riche who determine who gets what and at what time. This explains why they are not associated with any consistent ideology, why their membership is fluid, and why politicians easily move from one party to the other, including after losing party primaries.
In large part because of the institutional and systemic defects highlighted, Nigeria has, since 1999, been hard done by politicians regardless of their age. Indeed, although they have been, and continued to be, given the opportunity to prove their mettle, young people have not proved to be any better than others in Nigeria’s governance scheme. If anything, many of them have conducted themselves as rogues, cornering the commonwealth for themselves and carrying on as dictators. Thus, if there is anything that Nigeria and Nigerians can learn from Chile’s recent elections, it is the power of effective political parties and political participation. Gabriel Boric is president-elect largely on the strength of his ideas and the resolve of the Chilean voters, not the power of money, cabals and blatantly rigged ballots.
If experience has proved anything, it is the fact that effective leadership is not necessarily about age but about competence, integrity and vision. As Nigeria prepares for the next round of elections, therefore, there is a need for stakeholders in the democratic process, including the political parties, the media, the academia and, of course, the electorate to focus attention on the precedents and backgrounds of the aspirants coming forward in the political parties. Those aspiring for various offices must be subjected to rigorous public scrutiny so that only those adjudged to have the right ideas get on the ballot. The country’s fortunes cannot change without a drastic change in the leadership recruitment process.
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