By Alwan Hassan
About 11 years ago, I met a young man named Ayo Wisdom. It was sometime in 2013 or 2014, when I was serving as the National Field Coordinator of the All Progressives Youth Forum, APYF. The Forum was the one that took shape of the party’s youth agenda even before the official formation of the All Progressives Congress, APC. My role took me across Nigeria: from Lagos to Kebbi, from Sokoto to Cross River, and across every major city in search of the rarest resources in politics—young people who actually cared, deeply, sincerely, and relentlessly for our country.
And then I got to Ondo. Ayo Wisdom was not yet a household name. But even then, he was already Ayo Wisdom. He already had the combination that few youth leaders ever master: diligence without noise, respect without fear, and resourcefulness that bordered on clairvoyance.
He had the kind of mind that anticipated a problem before the rest of the room even realised something was off. If we were behind on logistics, Ayo was already thinking of a solution. If a local group was feeling unheard, Ayo had already spoken to them. He did not just wait to be told what the national plan was, he looked for it, studied it, understood it, and ensured that Ondo State was always in sync. He cared. That is what stood out most. He cared.
Not in the performative way that we have come to associate with Nigerian politicians. Ayo cared about young people in the trenches, the young party volunteers who gave their Saturdays to register voters, the girls in Akure dreaming of tech jobs, the boys in Okitipupa trying to make ends meet between school and okada shifts. When, in 2023, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu appointed him as Minister of State for Youth Development, many people were surprised. I was not.
By then, Ayo had already spent four years as the APC State Youth Leader for Ondo, a position he assumed in 2019 and held with characteristic humility and effectiveness. Those years cemented his reputation as a bridge between the party and its young foot soldiers, the one leader who never asked of others what he would not do himself. In fact, I was the first person to call him and tell him that he had been nominated for a ministerial post in 2023—a moment that reflected not just our long journey together, but the deep trust that has always defined our relationship.
I could not have been surprised. Neither were the hundreds of us who had walked the APYF journey with him. We knew. We knew that the Renewed Hope Agenda was more than just a slogan. We knew that President Tinubu, a man who has spent decades identifying and nurturing talent, had spotted in Ayo what we all saw years ago, and perhaps even more than we did.
And now, just a year later, Ayo Wisdom is no longer Minister of State. He is the Minister for Youth Development, in full. Not by lobbying. Not by fanfare. But by performance. Let us talk about that performance.
When Ayo took office, the Youth Ministry was, to put it mildly, uninspiring. It had long been the forgotten sibling of Sports, a department that issued statements on Children’s Day in May and International Youth Day in August, and offered little else. Under his watch, that began to change.
By the end of the second quarter of 2025, official performance reports showed that the Ministry had trained 15,509 young Nigerians in digital skills, exceeding its target of 10,000. The same reports recorded 97,212 young people mentored in career development against a target of 80,000, and 5,023 trained in crime reduction and peacebuilding. More than 250,000 young Nigerians had also enrolled on the Nigerian Youth Academy platform. These are not abstract numbers. They are young people who now have at least a foothold in the skills and networks that the modern economy demands.
Then there is the Nigerian Youth Academy, NiYA, which President Tinubu formally launched at the Presidential Villa in March 2025. NiYA is designed as a digital and physical learning ecosystem that brings together online courses, live classes, mentorship, entrepreneurship support, and civic education. The federal government has set an ambitious target through NiYA, to empower over seven million young Nigerians with digital and professional skills in the coming years, working with partners in Nigeria, Europe, and the Middle East. It is a bold promise, but it is now a matter of public record, with structures and partnerships already in place.
Beyond digital access, the work has also moved into physical infrastructure. Public reports and media coverage confirm that the Ministry has overseen the establishment of 20 vocational training centres across the country, providing market relevant skills to over 10,000 young Nigerians in areas such as tailoring, carpentry, ICT, and renewable energy. These centres are places where young people can leave with skills that translate into income, whether as employees or as small business owners.
On the economic side, the Youth Entrepreneurship Fund has been launched as a vehicle to provide capital to young entrepreneurs. According to published accounts, over 5,000 young business owners have already accessed support through this fund, while thousands more have been matched with senior professionals through a National Youth Mentorship Initiative. Put simply, there is now a pipeline, from idea, to training, to mentorship, to capital, that did not exist at this scale a few years ago.
His approach has also leaned heavily on partnerships. Through collaborations with the private sector and subnational governments, the Ministry has been linked to the creation of over 10,000 job opportunities for young people in different sectors. In one notable initiative with the Niger State Government and the National Agricultural Land Development Authority, NALDA, the plan is to engage 100,000 youths in agriculture, not just as labourers, but as participants in a value chain that can build real wealth over time.
Perhaps his most symbolic intervention, however, has been in how young people relate to the state itself. The Nigerian Youth Help Desk, a formal channel for young Nigerians to lodge complaints and seek support, has been activated and expanded. By late 2025, government briefings indicated that the Help Desk had processed around 5,700 cases, with several thousand resolved, and that a WhatsApp based chatbot had been launched to make access even easier. In a country where ministries often feel distant, this is a small but significant step. It says, we hear you, we see you, we will act.
Linked to this is the Young and Secure effort, a broader push to rebuild trust between young Nigerians and security agencies. Official communications describe it as a mix of training, dialogue, and reforms aimed at ensuring that young people are protected, not profiled. It is an acknowledgment that the #EndSARS scars are real, and that any serious youth policy must deal with them honestly.
Then there is the physical symbol of a new era, the Youth House in Abuja. In September 2024, President Tinubu approved the establishment of a Youth House in the Federal Capital Territory as a national hub where young people from different backgrounds can meet, work, and organise. Alongside that, the administration announced a plan for Youth Centres in every state capital, and Youth Green Houses in the secretariats of all 774 local government areas. These are not all built yet, but the policy direction is clear, youth spaces are no longer an afterthought, they are being written into the national architecture.
People ask me why I am so proud of this young man. I tell them it is not just because Ayo is doing well. It is because his success is not accidental. It is the result of a value system built over time, service, competence, empathy.
It is the story of a man who spent a decade walking side by side with Nigerian youths, and now runs ahead of them to clear the path. It is the story of how a President who believes in talent spotted a man who had long been preparing. It is, more than anything, a reminder that the right people, in the right seats, can move mountains.
In the end, that is what renewed hope means, not blind optimism, but justified faith. And in Ayo Wisdom Olawande, Nigerian youths have exactly that.
Justified. And proud.
– Alwan Hassan, a founding member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) writes from Abuja
