Youth Inclusion and Leadership Recruitment in Nigeria's Fourth Republic: An Assessment of the "Not Too Young to Run" Policy (2018 2025)

Abstract

The passage of the Not Too Young to Run Act in May 2018 represented the most significant legislative intervention in the history of Nigeria's Fourth Republic aimed specifically at expanding youth access to elective political office. By reducing the minimum age for the presidency from 40 to 35, the governorship from 35 to 30, the Senate from 35 to 30, and the House of Representatives and State Houses of Assembly from 30 to 25, the Act formally dismantled the highest constitutional age barriers that had historically excluded a generation of young Nigerians from direct leadership recruitment. Yet seven years after enactment and across two general election cycles, 2019 and 2023, the gap between the Act's democratic promise and its measurable outcomes in terms of actual youth representation in elected offices remains wide, contested, and insufficiently analysed. This study assesses the impact of the "Not Too Young to Run" policy on youth inclusion and leadership recruitment in Nigeria's Fourth Republic, covering the period from the Act's passage in 2018 through the post-2023 electoral landscape. This study draws on a systematic analysis of electoral data, scholarly research, civil society assessments, and policy evaluations published between 2019 and 2026 and is anchored in three theoretical frameworks. Political Opportunity Structure Theory, Elite Theory, and Social Exclusion Theory; The study evaluates the policy's strengths and documented achievements, analyses the structural, financial, and institutional weaknesses that have prevented its full realisation, examines the policy environment governing participation in Nigeria, and advances seven evidence-based recommendations for deepening youth inclusion in Nigeria's political leadership. Key findings include minimal but measurable improvement in youth legislative representation across the 2019 and 2023 elections, the decisive role of nomination form costs, with APC presidential forms set at ₦100 million in 2023 as the primary structural barrier to youth candidacy and the persistence of gerontocratic patronage networks that reproduce elite closure regardless of constitutional age liberalisation.