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LAHE Redefining the National Youth Service Corps
a proposal
by LAHE |
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Redefining the
National Youth Service Corps
By Larry Jones-Esan
The London Academy for Higher Education
Proposal for the Director General/ Ruling Council
Introduction
The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, established by the then military regime of General Yakubu Gowon in May 1973, thirty four years ago, on which a large and diverse segment of the Nigerian population as well as notable people around the world, have commended its establishment and eulogised its operation and achievements, especially its momentous role in promoting national unity, integration and rapid economic development of Nigeria. Quoting one of its former directors, Major General Hafiz Momoh, in his Preface to NYSC: Twenty Years of National Service, observed that the scheme has impacted, positively on various aspects of our national life. According to him, the NYSC "has come to be acclaimed as one of the most effective and successful instruments in our continuing efforts at achieving a humane and egalitarian society, based on mutual understanding, trust, tolerance and a common vision of our national destiny.
Though the ethos and spirit of national unity which the scheme symbolizes remains intact only in content terms but the applicable empowerment in realising the true expectations of the participants, has fallen short of actualization thus evoked the need to “REDEFINE” the future path and opportunity gateway that will reward the young intellectual minds brought together by this national service.
Nigeria has since moved on, changing the baton of governance from a military divide to a democratic unison, whist embracing and adopting change in its entire internal economic infrastructure with abundant transferable entrepreneur skill chain in both the private and public sectors through out the federation.
Underutilisation and/or no utilisation of Corps members in their primary assigned duty stations have been a perennial problem. In many organisations both private and public alike, corps members are reduced to glorified clerks and office assistants, with mundane task and entrusted with the real duties for which they have been posted and therefore unable to contribute meaning fully to national or self development.
In other cases, the Corps members are assigned tasks which are either far below their qualifications or are totally irrelevant to their academic training. The end result is that Corps members are unable to acquire the experience which was supposed to form a main component of their service year. In addition, many of them are frustrated and unenthusiastic, forced into truancy and idleness, failing to imbibe the necessary work ethics, while one of the key objectives of the scheme accelerating socioeconomic development is left unattained.
Problems of Organising Community Development Services (CDS): The CDS programme, though it has proved to be one of the more successful aspects of the scheme, has also had its share of challenges. These challenges have been induced by the absence of poor planning, logistic aids, plus the inadequacy of field supervision, the uncooperative attitude of some communities, and the lack of the needed continuity in some states and local governments.
Corps members have often been sent to build roads without shovels, axes, lorries and other tools and equipment. Some of them have been left completely to themselves and given no task to perform. Such lack of supervision by the state secretariats has led to embarrassing discontinuity in the execution of some projects, so that roads which are uncompleted by an out going set of Corps members are not necessarily taken over by the incoming set which, more often than not, prefers to embark on a totally new project.
Redefining the scheme is paramount in sustaining its core goals and objectives whilst providing purposeful value and essential directive tools for the participants. Henry Kissinger once said “If you do not know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere." It has been observed that amongst the several thousands corp members that pass out each year only 20 % gain employment out of which 5% of such employment is within their area of academic studies. This is true if your discipline is in the health industry with great disparity in other fields of studies particularly in the social sciences.
The objectives and aims of the REDEFINITION initiative is to compliment existing poverty eradication programmes in the federation, among the four NAPEP poverty reduction activities set out by the government to eradicate poverty in Nigeria by 2010:
- Youth Empowerment Scheme (YES)
- Rural Infrastructure Development (RIDS)
- Social Welfare Services Scheme (SOWESS)
- Natural Resources Development and Conversation Scheme (NRDCS)
the Youth Empowerment Scheme particularly which deals with capacity acquisition, mandatory attachment, productivity improvement, credit delivery, technology development and enterprise promotion embodies the core essentials of the redefinition initiative but does not translate in practice to significant economic freedom or essential employable skills. The scheme was designed on a national platform to be accessed by all youths, but however lacked full understanding of the transferable skills of those whom it was intended to target. It fell short of their expectations and was not fully subscribed. It was seen as an incentive that demeaned academic integrity and lacked proper assessment standards and in so doing marginalized those with higher intellectual challenges.
The National Youth Service Corps “Redefined” mirrors itself along the merits of the Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) scheme. SIFE is an American corporate initiative, that has presence in 1,400 university campuses in 48 nations around the world and has attracted the interest of over 250 leading global corporations,including such celebrated names as AIG,Campbell Soup,Wal-Mart,KPMG, 3M, GE,Coca-Cola and Unilever to name but a few, with a collective view that entrepreneurship and not hand outs can be taught in emerging markets.It helped participants develop business leadership skills and with such knowledge they created economic opportunities for others in their local communities. As the old saying “that if you teach one how to trade he will become good in his trade but if you keep giving him hand outs from other people’s trade he will never know how to achieve his own”.
Our argument and rational of the anticipated success of this initiative is the added value it will bring particularly the bespoke elements, of the redefinition which will address specific challenges faced by the members of the National youth service corps especially on leaving the camps, by educating and guiding the intellectual minds to think out of the box and embrace economic change without resentment or a sense of hopelessness.
It will train them without a steep learning curve the basis to identify their full potential either in running their own business, tapping into the various poverty reduction activities or even engaging roles in the employment market.
The apparatus within the initiative will be a source of guidance for participants as it will provide local or external pool of investors such as Local Entrepreneurs, Investment houses, Banks, and Investor in the Diaspora.
Existing Statistics:
September to October 2007
- Expected registration of corp. members: 100,000
- Actual number of corp member registered: 65,000
- Estimated corp members that will gain employment on passing out :13,000
- Members that will gain employment in their field of studies on passing out : 650
( Excluding Medical and Health studies )
September to October 2008
- Expected registration of corp members: 300,000
- Actual number of corp member registered: 170,000
(* Taken from the published speech of Head of Scheme: Brig Gen:Yusi Bomi in the The Punch Newspaper 16/10/07)
Entrepreneurial /Skill initiatives
The knowledge map of the Redefinition drive will be based on a structured formula that will provide an opportunity for the corp members to incubate a dialogue in leadership and social responsibilities among those wishing to start their own business or those aspiring for public roles by empowering them through self reliance. The redefinition will be facilitated on the following matrix:
- Leadership skills
- Emotional engineering
- Souring and cultivating Business ideas
- Business plans
- Sourcing Venture capitalist/investors
- Micro financing
- Bank loan
- Successful branding and strategy of product or Services
- Intellectual property governance
- Patent guidelines
- Business legal obligations for Limited liability companies and sole trading
- Market opportunity both local and export
- Ethics of business partnership
The matrix will be grouped into five critical business elements
- Market Economics
- Success Skills
- Entrepreneurship
- Financial literacy
- Business ethics
Outcomes – Career Prospect after NYSC
The configuration within this matrix will help each member of this scheme develop and actualize their full leadership qualities which will empower them in their chosen goals after NYSC.
It will arm them with the extra tools necessary in making positive contribution to the national economy through private or public office initiatives. It will negate the notions that since there are no job prospects after NYSC crime pays.
Redefining the scheme will encourage the business community to broker into the potential opportunities offered through the huge pool of intellects serving in the NYSC whether as venture capital investors or prospective employers. It will offer the scheme an acceptable face and credibility to its original objectives whilst reassuring its critics that it is not a breeding ground for militancy and anti social behaviours of disfranchised young men and women who have served their assigned communities in roles outside their academic composure and little to show of it after they have complete their duty in NYSC. This process will also put a check on the nation’s economic brain drain by encouraging home grown initiatives that will absorb on merit the Corps that pass out each year.
Larry Jones
Director of Studies
London Academy for Higher Education
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