The unemployment time bomb

According to the protesters, problem actually started on the day of the protest when government advertised some openings in the Federal Civil Service. As is the case with such openings, the Federal Civil Service Commission (FCSC) has the responsibility of recruiting workers and the graduates went to its offices located in Zone 3 Abuja to […]

According to the protesters, problem actually started on the day of the protest when government advertised some openings in the Federal Civil Service. As is the case with such openings, the Federal Civil Service Commission (FCSC) has the responsibility of recruiting workers and the graduates went to its offices located in Zone 3 Abuja to fill the mandatory forms required.
They were referred to the Federal Civil Service Club on Mabushi Road for the exercise but after allegedly waiting for hours without any official attending to them, they took to the streets in protest.
The angry youths blocked the major highway and it took the intervention of the police which pleaded with them for normalcy to return and for vehicular movement to be restored. But the Abuja protest is only a tip of the iceberg in terms of the number of the unemployed when you consider that we have 36 states in the federation with higher institutions that graduate hundreds of thousands yearly.
One of the angry youths who spoke to reporters during the protest said they had to protest in order to send a message to government that things are not well with a sizable number of graduates in the country.
“Since 6 a.m. I came to this place I can’t even access any worker in the office and we can’t even get the form, that is why we bounced on the streets to protest, to make the government know that we have graduates on ground, that we are looking for jobs; no jobs after spending lots of time in school is really very unfortunate.
“I think it is best dying than living without job. That is why you see us, we just bounce around the streets and we just blocked the roadside, you can see police men all over and we said vehicles should not pass and they just came and they pleaded that tomorrow they will answer us but that is not what we really want. We have been filling these forms for almost three years now; I have been at home, no job. We need jobs, it is what we want, it is jobs we want,” he said.
Many unemployed graduates are frustrated with no jobs and no trade nor entrepreneurial skills and even those with skills are often frustrated with the lack of electric power required to run most small scale businesses.
Another problem is lack of finance which hampers the ability to set up small scale businesses; you pay a lot of money in some cases to acquire the skills after graduation but you still have to contend with dilapidated infrastructure, chief among them power, to run any business.
So, most graduates are discouraged from the start. Daily Trust investigations reveal that infrastructure may not be the only reason why most fresh graduates opt for hardly available paid jobs; some want to gain valuable experience on the job or to save enough money to start a business which they are passionate about which takes away the frustration that comes with running a business that doesn’t give joy but necessary for survival.
An unemployed graduate Mohammed Husseini (not real names) said ,“I have been unemployed for two years now, I am a Fine Arts graduate but I have been working in a bakery for more than a year now. I have no business being in the bakery but I have no choice. The most painful part is that the bakery just pays enough for you to survive and not to do anything more.
“I still paint from time to time but  the job is so demanding that you don’t have time for any other thing. Besides, painting jobs don’t come every day so I am holding tight to what I have now. I just hope to get a better paying job where I can save enough to own my studio.”
Another unemployed graduate who does not want his name mentioned said he left his state for Abuja after graduation more than four years ago but has been moving from one low paying job to another.
A graduate of Geography, he said he has worked in a “cyber café/business centre, hotel, school, as an office assistant” but is yet to find his feet. He said he is interested in learning tailoring but cannot do that for now “because up till now, I don’t have a permanent address, I move from one friend’s house to the other and how do I feed myself if I dedicate 24 hours to learning it? But I am seriously considering moving back to my state where cost of living is cheaper and tailoring schools don’t charge plenty.”    
Of course, no one knows when the unemployment time bomb will explode but for years, many youths, including graduates that have been caught in criminal acts like armed robbery, kidnapping, hired killings and other serious crimes have always fingered unemployment as the culprit responsible for their actions.
Most unemployed graduates are law abiding citizens that will never consider crime but the potential to erupt in a fit of murderous rage out of frustration is a call for concern for the authorities.
The Abuja protests should serve as a wakeup call to not only the Federal Government but also the state governments to create the enabling environment for job creation. Not all graduates want to work for people; even before graduation, some have plans that will lift many of their colleagues from the labour market. But such plans cannot materialise when they are forced to provide infrastructure that ordinarily should be provided by government. Obviously, this is an impossible feat and every single second that passes without this major challenge being addressed is a ticking time bomb.