Former Jigawa State Governor, Dr Sule Lamido, has raised a stark question over Nigeria’s political future, warning that the youths being mobilised today to defend politicians may become the country’s leaders tomorrow without the character, values and preparation needed to govern.

Lamido spoke in Dutse during activities marking his 78th birthday, where he devoted much of his remarks to what he described as the abandonment of Nigeria’s younger generation by the political class.

Rather than seeing the youths as future leaders, Lamido said politicians had increasingly turned them into instruments for political battles, leaving them to fight for personalities and political interests.

“We seem to have abandoned the youth,” he said. The former governor said many Nigerians in their 20s and early 30s were growing up in a political environment where loyalty to individual politicians had replaced mentorship, national consciousness and preparation for leadership.

“Now, to the youth who are barely 25 or 30, it is all about a cycle of fighting for a particular individual, whether Governor A, Governor B or Governor C, singing their praises, being hired with machetes and sticks, beating each other and fighting for this big man,” Lamido said.

Lamido said the real danger was not the current political battles but what would happen when the politicians at the centre of those battles were no longer around.

“When they go in 25 years, they are going to be our leaders. So what are we doing to save them? That is my concern,” he said.

He argued that today’s political leaders were only temporary occupants of power, while the youths being neglected would inherit the consequences of decisions being made now.

“Beyond this whole Lamido, Atiku, Tinubu, Peter Obi and all this, we are just a passing phase,” he said.

“In the next five or 10 years, nobody is going to hear about Tinubu, Atiku, Peter Obi or Lamido. But these young men who have now been abandoned will then grow as leaders. Why are we not preparing them? That is my concern.”

The former governor said the question Nigeria should be asking was not simply who would control political offices today, but what kind of leaders the country was producing for tomorrow.

Lamido accused the political class of using youths as instruments of political warfare instead of investing in their development.

“Why should we simply, because we want to use the younger generation, make them our political labourers, our political mercenaries? Why?” he asked.

He said young Nigerians needed deliberate mentoring in integrity, empathy, character and national unity.

“We need to create a kind of awareness in them, so they will be properly restored on the path of character formation, integrity, human love, human empathy, friendship and everything,” Lamido said.

According to him, political differences should not destroy relationships among young Nigerians because party structures would change while the youths would remain part of the same national community.

“No matter your party, whether you are PDP, APC or any other party, you share something as youth,” he said.

“Therefore, while you are young and belong to different parties, you should not be enemies. These parties are nomenclatures. They keep changing.”

Lamido compared the current political environment with the experience of his generation, arguing that young Nigerians were previously exposed to political mentorship across regional and party lines.

“When we were at the age of 25, Nigerians, both in the North and the South, were youths who believed in each other, who respected each other, and there was no political enmity,” he said.

“People like Sardauna, Awolowo, Azikiwe and Tafawa Balewa never used us for political enmity. They never did. They were simply grooming us, mentoring us and giving us character formation.”

He then posed a question he described as the central challenge for the present generation of leaders.

“The issue is, are we giving our youth what we got when we were 25? That is the challenge,” he said.

Lamido warned that if the pattern continued, the country risked producing young people who learn political opportunism instead of public service.

“What is the lesson for the younger generation? What are they learning from us? Opportunism? That is my worry,” he said.

He urged young Nigerians to look beyond individual politicians and recognise their shared future.

“We are from the same generation, we have a common future. We have a future which we share in common. What do we do about it?” he asked.

The birthday event was held under the theme, “Nurturing Youths in Purpose-Driven Politics for the Building of a New Nigeria,” and featured paper presentations and panel discussions on youth development, political values and nation-building.