By Daniel Kanu
Nigeria’s youth problem is often described too narrowly. It is usually framed as unemployment, restiveness, or a lack of opportunity. In truth, it is far deeper and far more perilous than that. Nigeria’s youth problem is a long-standing failure, by the state and by society, to productively integrate young people into the nation’s economic, civic, and moral life.
This failure did not happen overnight. It has accumulated over decades, expressing itself today in mass unemployment and underemployment, weak education-to-work pathways, the normalization of shortcuts such as fraud and violent crime, disillusionment with leadership, erosion of shared values, and the steady emigration of young Nigerians who no longer see a future at home. Most Nigerian youths are not lazy or criminal. They are navigating a system that too often offers effort without reward, education without opportunity, and citizenship without dignity.
This reality has shaped my life’s work.
For nearly three decades, one conviction has guided me: Nigeria’s young people are its greatest asset, and the country’s future rises or falls on how intentionally we prepare, guide, and empower them. Every initiative I have supported, across sports, education, mentorship, entrepreneurship, and community development, has been driven by this belief.
My name is frequently mentioned in connection with the late 1990s, a period of intense political tension and national uncertainty. I do not shy away from that history. At the time, I was young, idealistic, and deeply concerned about the direction Nigeria was heading. Like many Nigerians of my generation, I believed the country needed a long-term, structured vision that placed young people at the center of national development. That belief was what motivated my involvement in mobilizing youths around General Sani Abacha’s Vision 2010.
Vision 2010 was not perfect, and its political context remains controversial. But stripped of politics, it represented something Nigeria has consistently lacked: long-term thinking. It sought to plan beyond election cycles, to align education with economic development, to restore discipline and national purpose, and to create institutional continuity. I believed then, and still believe now, that had Vision 2010 been genuinely implemented, it would have significantly addressed Nigeria’s youth problem by embedding youth development within a coherent national framework rather than treating it as an afterthought.
Unfortunately, Vision 2010 was never implemented. What followed instead was a pattern Nigeria has repeated since independence: abandoned plans, shifting priorities, short-term programs, and policy inconsistency. Successive administrations, through neglect, incompetence, and corruption, have steadily worsened the youth crisis. We expanded universities without expanding opportunities. We introduced youth schemes without sustainability. We spoke endlessly about empowerment while ignoring moral formation, civic responsibility, and family stability.
The result is what we see today: more educated youths, fewer meaningful opportunities, and a generation caught between ambition and despair.
As the years passed, the politics of the late 1990s overshadowed much of what came before and after. Public perception hardened. Intentions became entangled with a turbulent era. That is the nature of history. Not every effort survives the scrutiny of hindsight. Some initiatives are misunderstood; some are overtaken by events; some are judged only through the lens of controversy. What has never changed, however, is my commitment to Nigerian youth.
If anyone wishes to understand my mission, they need only look at where I have invested my time, energy, and personal resources for over two decades – outside the political arena. I chose early on to focus on practical, non-political youth development with real-life impact.
Sports development has been one of the cornerstones of that work. I have always believed that sports offer young people more than physical competition. They instill discipline, teamwork, confidence, global exposure, and social mobility. Through youth tournaments, talent showcases, and training clinics, I have helped create platforms for thousands of young Nigerians. Some earned scholarships. Others built professional careers. Many simply found structure, purpose, and self-belief, often at moments when their lives could have gone in very different directions.
Education and mentorship have been equally central. Over the years, I have supported scholarships, learning resources, training programs, and mentorship initiatives designed to help young people find direction. In a country where talent frequently competes with structural disadvantage, mentorship is not a luxury; it is a lifeline. Too many young Nigerians fail not because they lack ability, but because no one guided them through critical choices.
My work has also extended into entrepreneurship and skills development. Nigeria has millions of young people who may never follow traditional career paths but possess creativity, resilience, and entrepreneurial instincts. Through grants, workshops, advisory support, and community-based training hubs, I have worked to nurture those instincts into productive livelihoods. These efforts, quietly sustained over decades, form the true arc of my life’s work.
Yet as I continued working with young people across the country, a deeper pattern became impossible to ignore. Many of the challenges confronting Nigerian youths today are not merely economic. They are moral and social. I have seen talented young people derail their lives not for lack of opportunity, but for lack of guidance, values, and stable support systems. I have seen communities struggle with insecurity that no amount of policing could resolve because the foundations (families, role models, and shared norms) had already weakened.
It was this realization that led to the New Deal, and its core programs: Parents Against Crime Together (PACT) and Youths Against Crime Together (Y-ACT). The New Deal is not a reinvention of my mission; it is its evolution. After years of working with youths, one truth became undeniable: sustainable change requires intentional moral formation. Young people do not exist in isolation. They are shaped by homes, parents, role models, and the values society rewards or ignores.
Through the New Deal, my focus has been on prevention rather than reaction, on rebuilding what has been eroded rather than merely responding to its consequences. PACT calls parents back into active moral leadership. Y-ACT challenges youths to embrace responsibility, discipline, and ethical living. Together, they reflect a belief I have held all my life: Nigeria’s problems will not be solved by abandoning its young people, but by guiding them – firmly, compassionately, and consistently.
My story has never been about political labels. It has always been about people, especially young people. The early years of my journey unfolded in a complicated national context, and history will judge that era as it chooses. What matters now is the work that followed and the commitment that remains.
I have never stopped believing in Nigerian youth. I have never stopped supporting them. And I remain determined to do my part, as I always have, to help build a society where young Nigerians are not forced to survive by shortcuts, but empowered to succeed with dignity.
Nigeria’s future depends on how intentional we are about preparing the next generation. That is the legacy I have chosen to build, and the path I remain committed to.