Oyo APC and the Imperative of Cross-Generational and Transgenerational Politics | By Timilehin Kolade
Oyo APC and the Imperative of Cross-Generational and Transgenerational Politics
Timilehin Kolade
Politics is often understood as a contest for immediate power: who gets the ticket, who controls the structure, who wins the election and who occupies the office. But serious political organisations are built on a much longer horizon. A political party is not merely an electoral vehicle; it is an institution through which political ideas, experience, networks, values and leadership are transmitted from one generation to another. For the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Oyo State, this is why the question of cross-generational and transgenerational politics deserves serious attention as the party approaches the 2027 gubernatorial election.
Cross-generational politics is the ability of different generations to participate meaningfully in politics at the same time, while transgenerational politics goes further by asking whether the political institution being built today can survive the individuals and generations currently controlling it. The first is about cooperation across generations; the second is about continuity across time. Oyo APC needs both.
The party possesses an important political resource in the diversity of experience within its ranks. Senator Sharafadeen Alli, its 2027 governorship candidate, belongs to a generation with considerable experience in Oyo politics and public administration. His political journey has included local government leadership, service as Secretary to the State Government and Chief of Staff, and representation of Oyo South in the Senate. His running mate, Adesoji Adedeji, represents a younger political generation. Beyond the ticket itself, the wider APC family contains political elders, established actors, middle-generation politicians and younger organisers. This should not merely be viewed as an electoral combination. It can become an opportunity to construct a deliberate politics of generational complementarity.
The old must not be discarded, and the young must not be permanently postponed.
One of the recurring problems of political organisations is the misunderstanding of generational succession. Older politicians can sometimes interpret the emergence of younger actors as a threat to their relevance, while younger politicians can mistake accumulated experience for an obstacle to their advancement. Both tendencies can weaken a political organisation. A party without elders loses institutional memory; a party without young people loses its future.
The older generation possesses something that cannot easily be manufactured: memory. It remembers previous political battles, alliances, betrayals, negotiations, victories and defeats. It understands personalities and constituencies that may not be visible to a younger generation. It has seen political fashions come and go. But experience becomes counterproductive when it becomes an argument for permanent control.
The younger generation, on the other hand, brings energy, technological fluency, contemporary communication skills and a different understanding of society. It sees possibilities that established political actors may not see. But youth without historical memory can also become vulnerable to the illusion that every political problem has never been encountered before.
The intelligent political organisation therefore brings memory and imagination together.
The elder provides memory. The middle generation provides continuity. The younger generation provides renewal.
That is the foundation of cross-generational politics.
Oyo APC must therefore begin to think of political succession not as a generational war but as a relay race. In a relay, the purpose is not for one runner to run forever. The purpose is to ensure that the baton is transferred without being dropped. Political leadership should be understood in the same way. The question should not merely be, “Who is replacing whom?” It should be, “What political inheritance is being transferred, and how can the next generation improve it?”
This distinction is critical because political parties often confuse youth mobilisation with youth development. Young people are invited to rallies, deployed for social-media campaigns, used for grassroots mobilisation and expected to defend the party during elections, while strategic political knowledge remains concentrated among a small circle of older actors. Such an arrangement may produce temporary electoral energy, but it does not create a sustainable political institution.
Young people should not merely be mobilised for politics; they should be prepared for leadership.
There is a difference between political participation and political apprenticeship. A young politician who participates in rallies learns how to attend rallies. A young politician who is exposed to political negotiation, constituency management, policy formulation, conflict resolution, campaign strategy and institutional decision-making begins to understand how politics actually works.
Oyo APC needs this culture of apprenticeship.
The party has within its ranks people who have lived through different eras of Oyo politics. Their knowledge should not remain informal knowledge exchanged privately among political insiders. It should become institutional knowledge available to the next generation. A younger member should be able to sit with an experienced politician and understand why certain political decisions succeeded or failed, why certain alliances endured, why some political movements became powerful and why others collapsed despite possessing apparently impressive structures.
Political education of this nature cannot be acquired from social media alone.
This is where the idea of a political archive becomes important. Oyo APC should preserve its institutional memory. Major elections, campaigns, manifestos, speeches, reconciliation efforts, internal disputes, political transitions and strategic decisions should be documented. The testimonies of political actors who participated in important moments should be preserved.
Imagine a young APC politician in 2035 being able to study the political history of Oyo APC from 2011 through 2027, not merely through newspaper reports but through an institutional archive containing campaign materials, interviews, speeches, policy documents and reflections from those who participated in the events. Such an archive would be more than history. It would be political capital.
A party that fails to preserve its institutional memory repeatedly forces each new generation to begin from the beginning.
But transgenerational politics is not simply about preserving history. It is also about building institutions that are larger than individual personalities.
Nigerian political parties have frequently suffered from excessive personalisation. Structures can become associated with individual political patrons, and when the influence of the patron diminishes, the structure itself weakens. Transgenerational politics requires a different philosophy: the institution must eventually become bigger than the individual.
The political leader should therefore ask not only, “What can I achieve while I am here?” but also, “What political institution will remain after my influence has diminished?”
That is the deeper meaning of political legacy.
A leader may control a structure for four years or eight years. A statesman develops people capable of carrying an idea beyond his own political lifespan.
This is particularly relevant to Oyo APC because the party has experienced internal disagreements and has had to pursue reconciliation at different moments. Reconciliation is important, but a transgenerational political organisation should seek to develop a culture in which disagreement does not automatically become political destruction. Younger politicians must learn from older politicians that political competition is not necessarily permanent enmity, while older politicians must equally understand that disagreement from younger actors is not automatically disrespect.
A party that cannot accommodate generational disagreement cannot successfully manage generational succession.
The middle generation therefore becomes especially important. Too often political discourse is framed as a contest between “elders” and “youths”, overlooking the generation that must actually bridge the two. The middle generation possesses enough experience to understand the political traditions of the past while also understanding the expectations of contemporary politics.
They can translate between generations.
They understand the importance of grassroots political structures but also understand digital communication. They know that relationships matter in politics but also recognise that modern voters increasingly demand evidence, ideas and visible competence.
Oyo APC should deliberately cultivate this bridge.
The generational question must also extend beyond age. It must include geography, gender, professional background and political experience. Oyo is not politically homogeneous. Ibadanland, Oke-Ogun, Ogbomoso, Oyo and Ibarapa possess different political histories, local identities and networks. A genuine transgenerational strategy must therefore discover and develop political talent throughout the state.
The young politician from Oke-Ogun should have a pathway into leadership. So should the young organiser from Ibarapa, Ogbomoso, Oyo or Ibadan. Political advancement should increasingly be associated with competence, organisation, service and political imagination rather than merely proximity to a powerful patron.
Women must equally be part of this transition. Cross-generational politics cannot be reduced to older men mentoring younger men. Women must participate in strategic decision-making, policy development, communications, grassroots organisation and leadership succession. The objective should not simply be numerical inclusion but the development of genuine political capacity.
There is also a communications dimension to cross-generational politics. Different generations do not necessarily receive political messages in the same way. The message may be common, but its presentation must respond to the experiences of different audiences. Older voters may respond to political history, institutional credibility and community relationships, while younger voters may be more concerned with opportunity, employment, participation, technology and the credibility of political institutions.
A sophisticated political organisation must therefore learn the politics of connection before the politics of communication. It must understand its audiences before speaking to them.
This is particularly important in an era in which political communication is no longer controlled by traditional media. Social media has democratised political expression, but it has also made political communication noisier. A party can generate enormous online activity without necessarily creating political resonance. Cross-generational political communication requires the wisdom to combine traditional grassroots engagement with contemporary media strategy.
The Alli-Adedeji ticket offers Oyo APC an opportunity to make this generational relationship more substantive. The significance of such a combination should not end with campaign symbolism. The more important question is whether different generations within the party can work together in a manner that transfers knowledge, creates institutional confidence and prepares the next generation for leadership.
If that happens, generational diversity becomes an institutional asset rather than merely an electoral calculation.
But there is an even larger question. What happens after 2027?
If the party wins, who is being prepared for 2031 and beyond? If it loses, who will preserve and rebuild the organisation? Which young politicians are being trained? Which policy ideas are being documented? Which relationships are being institutionalised? Which political lessons are being preserved?
These questions distinguish a campaign organisation from a political institution.
A campaign is designed to win an election. A political institution is designed to survive elections.
This is why Oyo APC should consider establishing a structured political leadership academy or fellowship through which emerging members can receive training in political history, constitutionalism, public policy, communication, campaign management, grassroots organisation, negotiation, conflict transformation, legislative practice and ethical leadership. Experienced politicians, academics, public administrators and political practitioners can contribute to such a programme.
The objective should not be indoctrination. It should be political education.
Mentorship should equally become systematic rather than ceremonial. Experienced politicians should be encouraged to mentor emerging leaders over a sustained period. The purpose of mentorship, however, should not be to create political dependants. A good mentor should ultimately produce someone capable of standing independently.
That is the paradox of genuine political mentorship: the mentor succeeds when the mentee no longer needs the mentor’s political shadow to stand.
This also requires a cultural shift away from the politics of “our boys” and “our people”. Loyalty has an important place in politics, but loyalty without competence can weaken institutions. The more sustainable question is not simply, “Whose person are you?” but, “What capacity do you bring to the political project?”
A political party becomes stronger when political opportunity is connected to capacity.
The ultimate inheritance between generations should therefore not be merely political networks. It should be values.
What should one generation hand over to another? Political courage. Public service. Intellectual seriousness. Discipline. Negotiation. Tolerance. Institutional loyalty. Respect for citizens. Democratic competition. A commitment to improving society.
If a party transfers only its networks, it will reproduce both its strengths and its weaknesses. If it transfers its institutional memory together with a culture of responsible leadership, each generation has the opportunity to improve upon the previous one.
That is the real promise of transgenerational politics.
For Oyo APC, therefore, 2027 should not be treated merely as an electoral destination. It should also be viewed as an opportunity to construct a political relay system in which knowledge is transmitted, leadership is cultivated, institutional memory is preserved and responsibility is progressively transferred.
The older generation should not fear the young because the young are the future of the political organisation. The younger generation should not dismiss the old because experience remains an important political asset. The middle generation must become the bridge through which both are connected.
The objective should be continuity without stagnation and renewal without historical amnesia.
That is the politics Oyo APC needs.
Because the ultimate test of political leadership is not how many people remain dependent on a leader, but how many capable people that leader prepares to stand after him.
Politics becomes a legacy when one generation does not merely occupy power, but prepares another generation to understand, exercise and ultimately improve it.