Bayelsa Youth Congress

The Africa You Are Building

The continent you will leave behind is being built right now, in the decisions you make in office, in the systems you build or neglect, in the young people who watch how you conduct yourself and decide whether public service is worth their idealism or not. The stakes of this work could not be higher. Africa in the coming decades will either realise the extraordinary potential that its resources and its people represent, or it will continue to export its brightest minds and its raw materials while importing the finished goods that its own labour and ingenuity could have produced.
The difference between those two outcomes will be made by leaders. Not by foreign investors, not by international aid organisations, not by technology companies looking for new markets. By leaders. By the local government official who decides to fix the revenue collection system instead of skimming it. By the legislator who actually reads the budget rather than approving it on party instruction. By the president who appoints the most qualified person to run the central bank rather than a political ally. By the community youth leader who keeps her promises to the young people who elected her and teaches them, by example, that public life can be conducted with integrity.
You are the person this book has been written for. Not the person you are today, necessarily, but the person you are choosing to become. That choice is open. It is the most important choice an ambitious African makes. Make it with your eyes clear and your conscience awake. Your continent is waiting.

Excerpts of "The Politician's Hand Book book"

Open Letter: Experience is Not Defined by Serial Ambition

From: The Concerned Youth of Bayelsa State

To: Alhaji Atiku Abubakar

We, the youth of Bayelsa State—the home of Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan (GEJ)—have watched with a mix of disappointment and amusement your recent remarks on ARISE TV, where you labeled our son, father and former President "inexperienced."
While we respect your age and your long-standing pursuit of the presidency, we feel it is necessary to correct a narrative that is not only "revisionist" but fundamentally detached from the political history of our great nation.

1. A Résumé Without Equal
You claimed that Dr. Jonathan lacked the grooming necessary for the presidency. We find this curious. Before becoming President, Dr. Jonathan served as:

Deputy Governor of Bayelsa State
Governor of Bayelsa State

Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria

Acting President (steering the country through a constitutional crisis)

If rising through every single tier of executive governance constitutes "inexperience," then we must ask: What is your definition of experience? Is experience only gained by being a "serial candidate" for an office one has never actually held? Or is it gained by actually doing the work at every level of the federation?

2. The Experience of Results
"Experience" is best measured by outcomes, not by how many decades one has spent in political corridors. Under the "inexperienced" Jonathan:
Nigeria became the largest economy in Africa.

We maintained single-digit inflation for years.
The rebuilding of the railway system began in earnest.
The YouWin and GEJ-Agricultural programs empowered more youth in the Niger Delta and across Nigeria than any "experienced" rhetoric we hear today.

3. The Ultimate Test of Leadership
The highest form of experience is knowing when the peace of a nation is worth more than a personal chair. In 2015, Dr. Jonathan displayed a level of political maturity and "experience" that many veterans in your generation lack. He conceded power to save Nigerian lives, famously saying, "My ambition is not worth the blood of any Nigerian."
To the youth of Bayelsa and Nigeria, that is not the act of an inexperienced man; it is the act of a statesman.

Our Conclusion
Alhaji Atiku, as you prepare for your final outing in 2027, we advise you to focus on your vision for the future rather than attempting to dim the light of a man whose legacy is already secured in the global hall of fame.
In the creeks of Bayelsa and the streets of Yenagoa, we know what leadership looks like. It looks like service, it looks like humility, and it looks like Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.

Signed,
Ebimene Jeffrey Simon-Peter.

Dear Nigerians, ​INEC's conduct in the Abuja elections is a "litmus test" for 2027. The new law is built for rigging, but we are the counter-move. 🇳🇬

​📍 Phase 1: Massive mobilization for Voter Registration this April.

📍 Phase 2: Massive turnout to vote AND protect your vote

📍 Phase 3: Document everything. If it's not on your phone, it didn't happen.

​We can’t survive 4 more years of this. Use the "Protect the Paper" checklist below and get to work! 📄📸
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