AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT MUHAMMADU BUHARI ON HOW TO TACKLE UNEMPLOYMENT IN NIGERIA. - BY KAZEEM SODIQ LEKAN

With joy in my heart, I firstly congratulate you sir on your reelection as the number one citizen of Nigeria. I sincerely pray this regime becomes the best we ever had in the history of Nigeria. Obviously, many Nigerians voted you because of three reasons. The first reason which is the main reason is that you stand against corruption. Secondly, just because we believe that you can bring the ultimate change we have been clamouring for, and lastly, because of your love for the Nigerian populace and I believe that you will not betray our trusts.

As I have been taught in schools, one of the goals of a strong economy is to achieve full employment. Full employment is achievable and not a voodoo except those who decide not to work. Throughout this letter, I will be explaining how to achieve full employment, its advantages and disadvantages, and how to turn its disadvantages into our favour.

Unfortunately, Nigerian graduates studied with pains and live in vain. We spent a huge sum of money to acquire education but there are no resources to use or practice what we learned. Many graduates searched every nook and cranny of the country looking for jobs but there is no where to work despite our capability and willingness to be productive. Nigerian graduates now found it difficult to buy a hundred naira recharge card for guardians/parents who spent their last penny on us just to be educated and we keep praying and hoping that they will soon eat the fruits of their labour. In consonance with the quintessence of this letter, less emphasis would be laid on the suffering that Nigerian graduates are encountering, instead, I will quickly go to what could be the panacea to the lingering evil of unemployment in Nigeria.


It is evident that you are tackling the problem of unemployment in Nigeria through several government-funded schemes such as N-Power which was created in 2016 and P-YES in 2019 with the main goal of alleviating the knot of unemployment in Nigeria. If we take a critical look to N-power scheme, it only gives money for feeding and settlement of debt to the beneficiaries. It has not solved the problem of unemployment yet. With N-power, N30,000 is given to beneficiaries within a period of two years. With my calculation, N720,000 is being given to each beneficiary in two years.

As earlier envisioned, the problem of unemployment can become history in Nigeria perhaps if my ideas are welcomed. To be precise, according to my idea, I estimate that N1 trillion can help two million Nigerian youths/graduates to develop their own businesses if N500,000 is given to each youth/graduate. This amount is less than the total amount attributed to each beneficiary of N-Power scheme and historically, the richest man in Nigeria and in Africa at large, by the name of Aliko Dangote, started his business with the similar amount (N500,000). If Alhaji Dangote could achieve that, most Nigerians can achieve better. I plead that you should cease giving us money to eat but money to invest which can give a multiplier effect.

Alternatively, during the NYSC program, stipend is being given to each corps member. I suggest that you should turn this stipend to a sum of N500,000 and give it to us at the end of the one-year service. This would be highly welcome and it would be useful for something more beneficial, as it would be used for investment that can lead to economic growth and development. Throughout our years of study on campus, we took care of ourselves, definitely, we can take care of ourselves within a year both on camp and at our places of primary assignments. Those are the two options to generate funds if the governments do not want external sourcing.

I believe in graduates who can compete with each other when it comes to selling of mobile data (though it is a slap on our face that a whole graduate is selling mobile data). They will surely do more than that when they have a very huge capital to invest. But to ensure the efficient use of the fund, government should introduce an entrepreneurial scheme that will help the youths/graduates to make efficient use of the fund.

In order to ensure the continuation of the program, it should be mandated that each beneficiary should refund the money at the end of two years and it should be done installmentally either monthly, yearly or at the end of the two years. To achieve this, government should have the certificate of each beneficiary as a collateral and return it once the money is refunded.

If two million Nigerians can benefit in the first year, they would employ at least five persons that can work with them, which means two million beneficiaries can employ at least ten million people. This will make Nigerian economy grow faster and open a path to development within a very short period of time. In summary, within your next four years in office, you can help about fifty million Nigerians to be self employed.

In conclusion, if this suggestion works out, the unbearable poverty level would be drastically reduced, rooms would be opened for development, your tenure will never be forgotten. I believe this message will reach you and you will work on it as soon as possible. Thanks for reading sir.

Kazeem Sodiq Olamilekan is a fresh graduate from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State. He can be contacted on:
Call: 08094315990
E-mail: kazeemsodiq66@yahoo.com