The Special Assistant to the President on Social Media has identified the political will of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu as a major difference between the 2014 National Conference and the 2026 National Youth Confab, saying the President’s commitment would help move the process beyond deliberations to concrete implementation.
Mr Segun Dada stated this on Thursday at the State House, Abuja, during a pre-media briefing heralding the 2026 National Youth Confab scheduled to hold in October.
The Presidential aide said the Confab was designed to promote meaningful change by giving young Nigerians a platform to understand the workings of government, contribute solutions and participate in shaping the kind of future they want for themselves and the country.
He said the difference between the present initiative and previous national conferences lies largely in what he described as the political will of President Tinubu to ensure that young Nigerians are not merely encouraged to believe in the future but are given an opportunity to participate in creating it.
Dada explained that the initiative was conceived beyond immediate political considerations, stressing that young Nigerians must understand the system and engage constructively with it if they are to contribute meaningfully to changing it.
Rather than limiting their participation to criticism from outside government, he said the Confab would provide young Nigerians with an opportunity to sit together, deliberate on national issues and develop practical proposals capable of shaping policy and governance.
He explained that the decision to draw representation from Nigeria’s 360 federal constituencies was intended to ensure broad national participation and reflect the country’s diversity, similar to the representative structure of the House of Representatives.
The official Confab framework also provides for participation from all 360 constituencies and the diaspora.
According to Dada, the process would transcend political, ethnic and religious differences and accommodate young Nigerians from diverse backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to ensure that different voices and perspectives are represented.
He said the time taken to organise the Confab was deliberate, explaining that lessons from previous national conferences, particularly the 2014 exercise, were reviewed to identify shortcomings and avoid repeating past mistakes.
Contemporary reports from the briefing also quoted him as saying the organisers deliberately examined previous confabs before proceeding with the 2026 process.
“18 months ago when Mr President gave us this charge, we did not just jump into implementation. What we did was to look at the past confab, the mistakes that were made, and how to ensure that, given this opportunity, we will not make such mistakes again.
“As much as we want to be drivers of this, we believe sincerely that as young people who are already in the system, the only thing we can do now is to ensure all of the deliberations don’t just become another report and they end up on the shelves.
“So the idea behind us taking time is to ensure that it is properly planned because we want everybody’s voices to be audibly heard,” he stated.
Dada stressed that the emphasis would be on the quality and sustainability of the outcome rather than rushing the process, adding that adequate preparation was necessary to ensure that participants were genuinely heard.
He further said recommendations emerging from the Confab would not simply be documented and shelved but would be categorised according to the responsibilities of the executive, legislature and judiciary to facilitate implementation.
“We are not just looking at this from the point of view of it all today or tomorrow or of the next four years, but we are looking at the situation where it is only you can defeat the system unless you understand it, and this is what we want our people to do here
“Rather than being armschair critics, rather than just people bent online and on other social media platforms
“This president has given us an opportunity through the Honourable Minister of Youth Development to have a sit down.”he added.
Dada emphasised that relevant resolutions would be channelled to the appropriate institutions for consideration and action.
The Presidential aide maintained that the ultimate objective was to ensure that the Confab produces practical outcomes while creating a sustained platform through which young Nigerians can participate in shaping the country’s future.
The National Youth Confab 2026 is themed “Next Gen Nigeria: Crafting Solutions, Owning the Future”.
The confab is to begin in October 2026 and will involve 360 youth delegates who will physically participate in the conference in Abuja.
The Minister of Youth Development, Olawande Wisdom, had disclosed that the participating youths would be selected through an online portal opened for young Nigerians to register and participate.
The two-week Confab would combine a nationwide virtual consultation with a physical conference in the nation’s capital, Abuja
