Lagos State Governor, Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu, on Sunday, told Nigerian youths that whatever their position on the Olori uprising debate, they should make up their mind to never glorify ignorance or a lack of curiosity.

Delivering the lecture of the 2026 Undergraduate Convocation Ceremony of Babcock University themed, Breaking New Grounds, Sanwo-Olu said that there is nothing wrong with building an audience but let what you offer that audience be built on substance.

“Decide today that you will always be hungry for opportunity, hungry for learning, hungry for new challenges.”

The governor further said that new ground is broken by institutions and people willing to act without full knowledge or certainty, knowing that what matters most is a capacity and willingness to press forward, put the past behind, learn fast, and adapt nimbly.

“Let me offer this piece of advice, which speaks directly to your generation. The internet has recently been abuzz with debate about a so-called “Olodo Uprising” — the worry that our society is beginning to celebrate virality over value, popularity over proficiency, and entertainment over expertise. Whatever your opinion of that debate, make up your mind today that you will never glorify ignorance or a lack of curiosity. There is nothing wrong with building an audience — but let what you offer that audience be built on substance. Decide today that you will always be hungry for opportunity, hungry for learning, hungry for new challenges.

“There are many paths ahead — find your own. Do not try to copy and paste another person’s life. Some of you will pursue the creative industries, like Davido and BNXN, who walked this Babcock path before you. Some will follow the startup life, like Shola Akinlade and Ezra Olubi, who met here at Babcock and went on to co-found Paystack, one of Nigeria’s most beloved technology success stories. Some of you will build careers in medicine, law, public health, accountancy, nursing, music, ministry and public service.

“Never forget that your real value does not lie in your social media following — important as that may be. Start before you feel ready. Build a track record of finishing small things. Treat your first job or venture as a training ground, not a destination. Seek mentors deliberately. Guard your integrity as your only non-renewable asset. Dig your well before you are thirsty. Under-promise and over-deliver — not the other way round. And in all of it, remain purposeful and godly in service: let the fear of God, and the love of neighbor, be the compass by which you break new ground.”
Going personal, Sanwo-Olu recalled that almost forty years ago, he took stood in the same existential spot at the University of Lagos, where he completed an undergraduate degree in Surveying, in 1988.

“It was a very different world back then. If any of you were taken from the present and dropped into 1988, you would find it near impossible to recognize. No internet, no mobile phones, no email. The digital screens we knew were mostly television sets and simple calculators — everything else was analogue: print newspapers, wooden billboards, paper posters, analogue clocks and watches.

“Unlike you, we did not have the world at our fingertips. Access to information was limited to physical libraries. There were no virtual meetings or remote work opportunities. If you were fortunate, you had access to a fax machine; otherwise, you sent a letter that travelled slowly through the post and demanded extreme patience of you.

“But it was the world we knew and accepted, and we tried our very best to make the most of it. The same challenge now confronts you all — to accept the world as it is and to make the most of it. Do not waste your time wishing it were a different world. Embrace it, and then work to shape it into what you would like it to be.

“Like many of you, I harbored some anxiety about what lay beyond the walls of the University of Lagos. I wasn’t absolutely sure I wanted to build a career in surveying, even though I had spent years studying it. More than anything, I did not want to limit myself early on.

“Therein lies an important lesson. You do not need absolute clarity or certainty to take the next step. More important is faith — a concept you will all be familiar with, as products of a Christian university. The Bible tells us that faith is the evidence of things not seen. New ground is broken by institutions and people willing to act without full knowledge or certainty, knowing that what matters most is a capacity and willingness to press forward, put the past behind, learn fast, and adapt nimbly.

“In the words of the Apostle Paul in Philippians 3:13–14: “But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

Get used to trying and failing. Life rewards, most of all, the people who rise fastest after failing — not those who wallow in self-pity and a defeatist mindset.

“After graduating from university, I tried my hand at a string of businesses that failed. Sometimes the lesson is that you need to try again. Other times, the lesson is that this is not the line for you, and you need to try something else. The more you try and fail, the more you build the capacity to know exactly what lesson failure is teaching you, and how to use that lesson to propel yourself to the next level of your life.

“You may have heard the parable of the Chinese farmer. Once upon a time, there was a farmer in rural China whose horse ran away. It was his only horse, a prized possession, and now it was missing. Friends and fellow villagers flocked to his home to sympathize with him. “We are so sorry to hear this bad news,” they said. “It is so sad.”