Jubilee Fellows Programme and the focus on Jigawa youths
By Lawal Jet Kaugama
Governor Umar Namadi recently said he had the privilege of receiving Mr. Akubo Adegbe, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Delivery and Coordination in the Office of the Vice President, and Dr. Iorwakwagh Apera of the United Nations Development Programme in Nigeria.
Their discussions centred on the Nigeria Jubilee Fellows Programme, and the governor left that meeting both encouraged and more firmly convinced of something he has long believed: the greatest untapped resource.
In this country, is not oil, not land, not even capital. It is the energy, intelligence and ambition of our young people.
As the governor listened to their presentation, his mind drifted back to the campaign days across Jigawa State. Wherever he travelled, from Dutse to Hadejia, from Gumel to Ringim,, there were young people who filled the grounds. They came in their thousands, not merely out of enthusiasm for an election, but out of hunger for something more enduring: a government that would take their futures seriously.
Governor Namadi made them a promise by then. That promise has never left him.
It is the reason why youth development is not an afterthought in his administration, but an architecture. It is built into how the government governs, how it budgets and how it measures progress.
One of the very first institutions established upon assuming office was the Jigawa State Economic Empowerment and Youth Employment Agency. That decision was deliberate. Before constructing anything else, Governor Namadi wanted the young people of this state to know that a seat had been reserved for them at the table of governance and opportunity.
The results, whilst still growing, are already meaningful. More than 10,000 young Jigawa indigenes have secured employment in the education, health and agricultural sectors through this agency. Close to 9,900 others are actively supporting the maintenance of schools, hospitals and courts across our local government areas by keeping the infrastructure of public life functioning and, in doing so, acquiring skills and dignity in equal measure.
These are not mere statistics. Each figure represents a household where hope has been restored, a young man or woman who wakes each morning with purpose.
When the governor shared some of Jigawa’s agricultural initiatives with his guests from Abuja and UNDP, he pointed to one example he considers particularly instructive. Before his administration deployed its tractors and harvesters to serve Jigawa farmers, it first sent 30 young indigenes to China for specialised technical training. Many of the machines that today are working on our farmlands were assembled by those same young men upon their return.
That detail matters enormously. It means that when a harvester breaks down in a remote part of this state, there is local expertise available to fix it. It means that the knowledge lives here, amongst us, rather than being perpetually imported. It means our youths are producers, not merely beneficiaries.
This is the distinction Governor Namadi is most anxious to establish in Jigawa between programmes that give young people things and programmes that give young people capacity. Both have their place, but it is the latter that endures.
When a young woman is trained in agribusiness, she does not merely feed herself; she feeds others and, in time, employs others. When a young man is equipped with technical skills, he becomes a resource for his entire community. The multiplier effect of investing in human capital is something every serious government must reckon with.
The Nigeria Jubilee Fellows Programme fits squarely within this philosophy. Any initiative that expands structured opportunity for educated young Nigerians will find Jigawa State not merely receptive but actively engaged.
Governor Namadi assured his guests of this during their meeting, and he reaffirms it publicly today. Jigawa comes to such partnerships with its own track record and its own ideas.
Our governor, in humility, placed on record his sincere appreciation for His Excellency, Vice President Senator Kashim Shettima, the Office of the Vice President, UNDP Nigeria and all stakeholders committed to widening the door of opportunity for Nigerian youth. This is because collaboration of this nature — between federal institutions, international partners and state governments — is precisely how we move the needle at scale.
Jigawa’s young people are not lacking in talent. They are not lacking in resolve. What they require, in many cases, is simply a credible opening, a chance to prove what they already possess. Governor Namadi remains committed to providing that opening, again and again, for as long as it takes.
By the fogoing, we ask Allah to bless this collective effort and grant every young Nigerian the future they deserve.
Lawal Jet Kaugama, a commentator on national issues, writes from Kano.