To effect the desired change, Nigerian youths must get it right —National Coordinator, DYAN Bashir Nasir

Nasir Bashir is the National Coordinator of the Democratic Youth Assembly of Nigeria (DYAN), a Youth group concerned with the mobilisation of Nigerian youths for positive development. In this interview with Soji Ajibola and Rukayat Ogunwade, Bashir insists that the country may not experience devised change until its youths get it right. Excerpts:

What is Democratic Youth Assembly of Nigeria all about?

It is a conglomerate that serves as a platform, which was formed under the mandate of purely young Nigerians from across the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria. It was formed primarily to promote peace, unity and harmony, advocate for good governance, advocate for quality funding of the most important sectors of the economy, address challenges faced by youths and as well bridge the gap between the government of the day and a sustainable population of Nigeria which are the young people of which you are aware that is Nigeria constituted of 75 percentage of youths. We believe we have this power and mandate as youth to contribute our quota to ensure we take Nigeria to the promised land because looking back at our past leaders including late Obafemi, Sir Ahmadu Bello among others who struggled for Nigeria‘s National development when they were youths, we believe we can also do the same It is just that politicians are using religion and tribe as a weapon to divide us, but we have to resist all this form of division among Nigerian youths, as we all know we can only help ourselves and help our country when we stand in unity. We don’t have any country but Nigeria where ever we find ourselves, we will be regarded as second-class citizens but can can only exercise our right as first-class citizens when you are in Nigeria. We have every resources needed to emerge as the best nation on earth but still suffering because of bad governance and poor leadership, lack of patriotism, we are where we are today. We feel that with the establishment of DYAN, we will be able to contribute immensely to national development because we are focusing of the re awakening the spirit of patriotism in the minds of young Nigerians and as well as producing a new generation of Nigerian who will be ready and fully prepared to take over leadership in various sectors of development particularly the corridors of power.

 What is the motive behind the award and why the choice of Your organisation recently bestowed on the chairman of Tribune Newspaper, Ambassador (Dr) Tokunbo Awolowo-Dosumu?

It is a fact well known that Obafemi Dynasty is an institution which every young Nigerian would have to come and tap because starting from the founding father of the ANNPLC, Dr Obafemi Awolowo SAN , we all know about his activities then in achieving independence for Nigeria and we are all aware of the commitment and sacrifices made for the betterment of all Nigerians, so we believe Dr Tokunbo Awolowo Dosumu have inherited all from her father and reflecting it in the Nigerian youth community and she is someone who have passion for the under privileged and marginalized community and as well doing everything to support humanity and the youths. So we have violated the rule if we go without tapping from her vast wealth of experience, so we say kudos to her by presenting this great award of Icon of humanitarian service.

Our award is not just given to anybody,  but given to people who are worthy of character, integrity and excellence, someone who has contributed immensely to the development of South-West region and Nigeria in general. That is why we feel we should present this award to her so that she can feel motivated and encouraged to do more. This is not coming from government but her children, the Nigerian youths that believe in her and are emulating her footsteps. She is our mother, she should try to call our attention if she sees that we are failing. As we all know when the young identify with the elderly people, it is going to reflect that in our day-to-day activities. So I congratulate Dr Awolowo-Dosumu once again for the award.

In the past we have had youths in position of leadership, how can you rate their performance?

The performance of Nigerian youths is because it’s like Nigerian youths have missed the way, they did not represent us well.l I don’t want to mention names, because recently we saw a governor who had just marked 50, we can see he is having cases with the Financial Crimes institutions. Majority of the youths who are opportune to be in leadership positions in the past and current administration were not representing us well that is why the elderly ones feel these youths are not even ready to be trusted with this assignment, that is why we have come up with all this initiatives of re awakening the spirit of patriotism, training youths on leadership and of course we have recorded a lot of success because we have a lot of our members who were are now serving in different capacities in the government of so many states that are representing us well and not doing what the others are doing because they are part of our struggle. So we feel with our programmes and strategies put in place any body who pass through our tutelage will not be find guilty of mismanagement, corruption and abuse of power. But I will like to commend the administration of Nigeria President, Bola Tinubu for carrying the youths along in his administration, because he believes that the youths have a lot of contributions for them to achieve their mandate that is why I have used this opportunity to plead to young Nigerians who have found themselves in different corridors of power in state or federal level, that they should please represent us well and distance from all sorts of corruption and mismanagement, so that the elder breeds can believe that we are ready to be trusted because we have the capacity and energy to take Nigeria to the promise land so we want.

 Like you say, youths have the energy and capacity to serve, how do we change the narrative as we approach 2027?

Thanks for the question, all I can say is that we have to demand electoral reform in such a way that any politician who plans to rig elections through whatever means should be arrested and all such of attempts should be stopped. This is condemnable, as politicians are the ones putting us in this serious mess because the electorate is doing their best to go out and exercise their civic duties to vote but a politician sitting somewhere will use his money to hijack everything. Last week during a chat with a patriotic Nigerian, he said he had to trek more than 10 kilometers in Cross River to exercise his civic right out of love for his nation but to his dismay, that there was malpractice at the center, so he felt discouraged in voting in another election to be held in future as he believed his vote won’t count. Imagine someone stealing money he doesn’t even know what to do with it, imagine someone buying 700 plus houses, what is he going to do with it? So all these things had to stop if we really want to progress because there is extreme poverty while other people are living in opulence. Their children are just intimidating the poor on the streets of Abuja with luxurious vehicles and you expect peace to reign in this country, it will never unless we realise that it is high time Nigerians come back to our senses to do what is right, face the reality, develop our economy, develop education and infrastructure for the average and poor Nigerians to enjoy the country, that is when we can have peace in Nigeria, . I am using this opportunity to appeal to INEC to show Nigerians that this coming election their vote will count and, of course, their vote will change the system. It baffles me when INEC refuses to conduct bye election on time after a lawmaker dies, just like what is currently happening in my local government for more than 9 to 10 months now. So the people in power should allow INEC and security personnel to do the right thing so that we can have a safer and more peaceful country.

 Don’t you think youths are the foundation of their problems because of their refusal to support their fellow youths into power, so where are we heading to?

Nigerian youths are not yet ready to get it right, because the issue of monetisation is a very alarming disaster because instead to youths to annoint there own, they follow the money bags, just as they say if you follow money before doing anything you will discover that you will not be able to achieve anything meaningful from it, it saddens that Nigerian youths are only after money because they want to drive expensive cars, they get distracted easily because of the things they will gain from it, so we are backstabbing each other, Nigerian youths are not in the right way to get it right unless when we minimize our affection for worldly things, desist from collecting money from politicians and support each other so that we can be able to focus on our goals Just like our leaders have done in the past. Sadly, Nigerian politics has become business enterprise but if not for corruption, Nigeria have all resources needed to emerge best nation in the world. All we want is a national development.

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