by Eyo Emmanuel
In Nigeria it seems we’re always in a constant celebration of national opposite day. National opposite day simply put is that day where when a person says hot, he means cold and when a person says black he means white.
In Nigeria we passed the not too young to run bill a while ago with the hopes that young people will finally be given the opportunity to bring in their youthfulness and zest into the leadership of our nation with the hopes that this will lead us on the right track.
Fast forward to 2019 and the “youngest” minister on the ministerial list being Clement Anade Agba (44) the minister of state for Budget and National Planning. Could It be that this administration has a different definition of what the word “youth” means.
With the clamor for youth representation in the country, we still have two seventy year olds who made their way to the ministerial list in the persons of Sabo Nanono (73) the minister of agriculture and Osagie Emmanuel Ehanire (72) minister of health.
It could be said that the president was eager to have people within the same age bracket as him be on the ministerial list, I guess with old age comes the need for company of the same age bracket.
The bulk of the ministers are in their 60’s and even the ministers that are in their forties make up for the second least represented age bracket of the ministers with three out of the four ministers in their late forty’s.
With this sort of representation in the ministerial cabinet, the quest for young people leading our nation seems to be a far stretch from becoming reality.