During the early hours of Monday 7th of May, the youth of Nigerian #voteorshutup2019 social movement, took advantage of the early morning commuters traffic and stormed the streets of Victoria Island, Ikoyi and Maryland simultaneously to hand out thousands of free voters guide booklets and to educate the people on the importance of obtaining their PVC and participating in the upcoming elections.
This is a contribution made independently by Nigerian youth for Nigerian youth as a bid to support each other in getting involved in their country’s politics, the moment has seen a group of young people come together to discuss the situation of their country utilising social media as a positive tool to spread positive knowledge instead of negativity.
According to a representative of the movement Mr Osazee Bazuaye, a hospitality and lifestyle specialist “It is easy for young people to complain, so many young people don’t bother to vote but they love to complain about the elected officials, we want people to come out and vote, we don’t care who you vote for just vote”.
The movement started silently early this year and has seen a gradual growth in interest from its peers, we asked another representative, Miss Moe of eventsbymoe what she reactions she hoped to gain from politicians and she said “we want the politicians to acknowledge the efforts of groups like us, this is something we are passionate about and we are not even politicians so we expect the passion from the politicians to be 100 times more than ours in getting young people interested in supporting them”.
Another representative of the moment added “The movement consists of part-time volunteers and interests has grown within celebrities and even peer leaders from other states such as Edo, Rivers and Cross River, we really hope we are able to continually raise the funds to remain consistent”.
Nigerian youth make up over half the population of the country, it has been made clear by politicians and business moguls that the youth population is an under-utilised resource.