Youth demand 407 legislative seats in 2019

A coalition of 55 youth organisations across the country under the auspices of the ‘Not Too Young to Run Movement’ has demanded that political parties reserve 407 of the 1,350 legislative seats at both states and national levels for youths in the 2019 General Elections.

They made the demand yesterday in Abuja at a joint media briefing as part of activities of the movement’s declaration of August 8, 2018 as the National Day of Action on Youth Candidacy and Democratic Primaries.

The program manager, Youth Initiative for Advocacy, Growth and Advancement (YIAGA-Africa), Cynthia Mbamalu; Chief Executive of Connected Development (CODE), Mr Hamzat Lawal; NTYTRM strategy members Nana Nwachukwu and Chioma Chuka; and YIAGA-Africa Senior Program Officer Ibrahim Faruk spoke at the briefing.

According them, based on timetable issued by Party

to the the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), party primaries are expected to commence as from August 18, 2018 and that the movement will be engaging political parties to demand that the parties reserve tickets for young men and women with character, capacity and competency.

They demanded that the parties set aside 298 of the total 990 seats in the state houses of assembly across the six geo-political zones for youths and also 109 of the 360 tickets of the federal house of representatives.