YOUTHS AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

GREAT IMO JONATHAN 

A few days ago, I sat with a group of young Nigerians who invited me over to explain what was going on in the nation. Especially as it relates to the economic challenges of the moment. They did because they saw me on a national television discussing issues of governance and because I had campaigned for our great party the All Progressives Congress (APC), during the elections. They believe I should have some answers. 

My take away from that interaction was:

1. There is hunger in the land and most of our youths are affected. 
2. The education we have been giving to our youths are not solution based, there is no meet between our needs and our academic institutions, too many professors but no quality education.
3. Our youths were literarily mentally demobilized by the military rule and the misrule of PDP that lasted 16 years.
4. Our youths indulge in cultism because there is no sense of security.
5.  They want to be useful but Nigeria is not finding them useful. 
6. The uses our leaders find for them are for political thugry and entertainment, football inclusive.
7. Our youths have become desperate and are now in search for voodoo money, either through Yahooyahoo, football bet, kidney merchandizing, yaho plus and kidnapping. And all are symptoms of a deep seated problem; youth neglect. 

It is indeed worrisome to know that we have over 64 million unemployed youths in Nigeria, yet we are hungry. What is the correlation between the hunger in the land and the unemployed 64 million youths? What is the correlation between the 17 million housing deficits and these millions of unemployed number? What is the correlation between the twenty five thousand cortege hospitals needed in our rural communities, rural roads needed to be built, pharmacies that needs to exist in every community, street lights that needs to be mounted in every street and village, streets that need to be swept, mass transit buses and taxis that are nonexistent in cities, modern rail lines that are supposed to crisscross our states, doctors that are supposed to man our hospitals, modern abattoirs that are supposed to exist in every senatorial district, general hospitals that are supposed to be in all the 774 local governments, modular refineries that are supposed to be in every state, independent power projects that are supposed to be owned by local government, alternative energy companies that are supposed to be springing up everywhere, over five million hectares that are supposed to be cultivated, food processing factories that are supposed to dot communities, phone factories that are supposed to produce over 100 million phones needed in Nigeria every year, the electronic factories that are supposed to produce our television sets, radio sets, refrigerators and other appliances?

Finding the correlation between these needs and these numbers of jobless youths is at the heart of solving youth unemployment in Nigeria and other associated problems. We need to know that at the heart of solving these issues is finding the correlation. Enough of argument about the availability of money and non availability of it, we have what it takes to solve these problems in the now. Money is a virtual reality, TRANSLATING OUR NEEDS INTO JOBS WILL BRING IN THE MONEY. Because understanding money matrix as it relates to creating value is key. 

It is a simple matter, only if we can trust ourselves not to fiddle with our money and to manage inflation; nothing stops us from deploying our M2 right away. With Money in Value we can turn Nigeria into a massive industrial estate in the next one to three years. We should only be afraid of venturing into that if we are going to remain as criminal minded as we have always been. 

Our youths are becoming inpatient and we need to do something quickly to get them engaged and to use them to solve our problems. If we need more power; if we want our public buildings and facilities to be well maintained; if our schools require more trained teachers or more furniture; if public transportation is deserving of more infrastructure, equipment and personnel; whatever inadequacy you can think of, it can only mean that we are in dire need of creative minds and industrious hands who can take on these troubles.  Indeed, the more these gaps remain in our development efforts, the more relevant our youth must be as solution providers. 

As much as our educational institutions are not churning out the best of qualities there can be, there are still young Nigerians with the creative ingenuity to solve national problems. 

APC should start by appointing young creative minds into boards and agencies, and they don’t necessarily have to be children of notable people and party leaders. We should consider appointing young creative minds that can bring innovative ideas that can solve problems. Young people with creative ideas like those of Bill Gate and Mark Zukerberg and who can drive them.

If Bill Gate’s company makes more money than Nigeria annually it means that what is missing is solving the correlation, which lies with our youths. APC leaders should cherish our youths and must bring them fully onboard, because, it is on their shoulders that the continuous survival of Nigeria rests. When the powerful forces of imagination and innovation related in the minds of the youth are put to use, it would take us all towards a life beyond our expectation and experience.

The future of this country belongs to its teaming youth population, preparing the youth for that future is as much an important task as ensuring that the youth themselves appreciate very early the enormous historic burden that awaits them; the burden of leadership and service which ironically is the truest path to national progress.

Giving our youth roles to play in governance and assigning responsibilities to them in this APC administration will undoubtedly create a sense of ownership and belonging for them. It will empower them and it will lead to high sense of self-esteem which in the long run adds value and purpose to their lives.

Youths are the future health, strength and wealth of any country. THEY are repositories of the vision of a country’s progress and growth, we must engage them in activities and get them to participate in events that will contribute to the development of the country and shape their destinies.

And to our young people out there, I want to advise you to stop lazing about waiting for government to meet your needs. Get up and do something with your life. Come up with creative ideas to solve national problems. Ideas they say rule the world, oil and cheap money is not the way out. You can’t afford to continue to wait, start something no matter how small. We are the solution that Nigeria has been waiting for, stop blaming and start creating. Because a country, whose youths are visionless, propelled by blind ambition of self aggrandizement and delusion of grandeur, can only be a curse rather than a blessing. We are a blessing to Nigeria, we are not a curse.

God bless every Nigerian youth!

– Great Imo JonathanPR, Media and Business/Personal Development Consultant.