By Bola Omotosho
The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) was created by the Federal government of Nigeria in order to involve young compatriots in the country’s progress and improvement. Following the Nigerian Civil War between 6th July 1967 and 15th January 1970, the Supreme Military Government under the leadership of General Yakubu Gowon launched its post-war 3Rs ( Reconciliation, Rehabilitation, and Reconstruction) agenda. This agenda gave birth to the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) on May 22, 1973.
According to the scheme, the idea behind the creation of the NYSC was to develop and encourage better connection among young Nigerians with a view to ensuring national unity. Part of the goals of the scheme include inculcating discipline in the Nigerian youths by instilling in them a tradition of industry at work and of patriotic and loyal service to the country in any situation they may find themselves. Others include raising the moral tone of the Nigerian youths by giving them the opportunity to learn about higher ideals of national achievements, social and cultural improvement and developing in the Nigerian youths the attitudes of mind acquired through shared experience and suitable training which will make them more amenable to mobilization in the national interest.
Like all government’s policies and programmes, despite its various shortcomings, the NYSC scheme has over the years succeeded, in its own little way, in fostering unity in the country. Through the programmes, a few inter-tribal marriages, which ordinary might not have taken place, have been consummated. Equally, some of the corps members, seeing the limitless possibilities for prosperity in their host communities, have stayed back in those communities (irrespective of tribal and ethnic differences) to earn a living through various legitimate means. Similarly, through various means of social interactions, a few of the corps members have been able to learn, speak and understand the languages spoken in their places of primary assignments. Also, lots of the corps members have been exposed to various customs and traditions of diverse parts of the country through the NYSC scheme.
Indisputably, therefore, the NYSC scheme has over the years been a uniting factor in the country. It is, however, gratifying to note that the coordinators of the scheme are taking advantage of the platform to empower corps members for better economic opportunities, especially after the completion of the scheme. This is a quite smart and creative move by the leadership of the scheme, particularly in view of the astounding unemployment situation in the country.
In March 2012, the NYSC leadership introduced Skill Acquisition and Entrepreneurship (SAED) Programs into the NYSC orientation course content. The goals of the scheme include sensitization and mobilization of young graduates for skill acquisition annually and facilitation of training and mentoring of young graduates in skill acquisition and entrepreneurship development of self-reliance annually. Others include promotion of public-private partnership for entrepreneurship development and self-reliance among Nigerian youths and attachment of corps members to appropriate organizations for skill acquisition and entrepreneurship development.
The SAED scheme is an initiative driven to aid Corp members in obtaining necessary skills that will encourage them in turn to pursue entrepreneurship careers in order to reduce their possible time spent in the labour market in search of paid employment. The SEAD Department is made up of two divisions namely: Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship and Empowerment.
To institutionalize the scheme, the Federal Government raised the number of Departments in the NYSC from seven to eleven with Department of Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) as one of the new departments.
The introduction of SAED into the NYSC Scheme has helped lots of fresh graduates to be self-reliant, creating employment opportunities instead of searching for white collar jobs. The project is a nationwide initiative, targeted at young graduates who are mobilized and deployed for the NYSC scheme. It is designed to be implemented within the framework of camping exercise (in-camp) and the service year of the corps members (post-camp).
The in-camp phase of the project focus largely on creating the entrepreneurial and self-reliance spirit, helping corps members explore income generation opportunities available, with a view to identifying the one that best suits their personality/circumstances and professional training with some forms of hands-on training as well as development of business plans. The post-camp phase provides the platform for a rigorous training of interested corp members with a view to equipping them with the necessary technical/vocational skills as well as business competence needed to start up business.
This is carried out in partnership with various organizations with cognate competence and experience in the identified skill sets. There are about ten skill sets which cut across various sectors of the economy, ranging from energy, construction, agro-business and environment. The training focus more on Poultry, Snailry, Animal Husbandry, Fish Farming, Plantain and Banana Sucker Plantation, Catering, Bead Making, Fashion Designing, Hairdressing and Make-up, Photography and Graphics Designing.
NYSC partners with several companies and training outlets across the country to obtain and provide the very best to the nation’s corps members at subsidized rates, courses and live training programs developed by sponsors to equip them with skills pertaining to independent sustenance and business management understanding as well.
Today, the SAED policy is one of the few in the country that is really helping in empowering and preparing the youths for productive engagements. From its inception till date, no fewer than 971,272 corps members have benefitted from the skill acquisition program while over 7000 have established their preferred business.
Corps members who partake in the skills acquisition training, and who at the end of their service year, are desirous of establishing their businesses, are given interest-free loans to start such businesses. The main requirement is to have a workable memorandum of understanding, MoU with a guarantor and the only collateral required is the certificate of national service, which will be released to the corps member at the end of completion of the loan facility. So far, about 5, 000 to 8, 000 corps members have accessed the facility. The loan ranges from N150, 000 to N250, 000 per individual for small scale enterprises.
That these loans are being repaid by the first set of beneficiaries is an indication that their businesses are thriving. It is not only the corps members that are building successful businesses, but also the labour market is beginning to find answers to the large scale unemployment in the country, because for every business that succeeds, one or two members of the communities where the business is located will also gain employment from the corps members.
Hopefully, relevant NGOs, corporate organizations and spirited individuals would take a cue from the NYSC initiative by coming up with similar schemes to empower more youths in our society. This, indeed, is a sure way of banishing unemployment, youth restiveness and other negative youth related tendencies from our space.
Omotosho, a NYSC member, is with the Ministry of Information & Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja