The Social And Economic Costs Of Unemployment By Nasir El-Rufai

One depressing reality in
virtually every Nigerian
family is the sight of adults
in their late 20s and 30s who
left school years ago, but
have been unable to secure
gainful employment. Thus, at
an age when they are
supposed to be productive
and integral parts of our
economy, building the
fabrics of our social life by
settling down to raise
families, and supporting
their parents in their old age
materially and emotionally,
millions of them are still at
home – with parents,
relatives or simply roughing
it out with more fortunate
friends who have managed
to find something to do.
To put the situation in
context, Colonel (later
General) Yakubu Gowon
became Head of State of
Nigeria at the age of 32. Not
many people realize that
despite his impact and
legacy, General Murtala
Mohammed was
assassinated at the age of
38. Late Mathew Mbu was an
ambassador at the age of 26.
Obasanjo handed power to
civilians in 1979 at the age
of 42. Late Anthony Enahoro
then member of Federal
Parliament tabled the
motion for Nigeria’s
independence at the age of
30. Most of the military
officers who commanded
battalions during the civil
war were in their 20s and
30s….the examples are
endless.
While recognizing the special
circumstances under which
these patriots operated, the
fact is that they were in
charge of government,
making and implementing
public policy decisions
affecting the lives of millions
while in their 20s and 30s.
That many Nigerians still
yearn for the good old days
means that the earlier
generations were largely
successful and managed to
keep Nigeria united despite
civil unrest, the civil war,
military coups and through
very difficult periods in our
history.
By contrast, many young
men and women in Nigeria
today of the same age are
still waiting to graduate,
have graduated but cannot
find jobs, have found jobs
but lost them to government
economic mismanagement,
have never left home or are
squatting somewhere with
no end in sight. Many of the
few who have found jobs
cannot afford
accommodation. It is a sad
truth too, that many
Nigerians in their 20s and
30s have never experienced
the joy and privacy
associated with having a
room to themselves, much
less a tiny apartment. How
can we get the best of them?
How can we actualize the
true potential of a 30 year
old that still has to share
rooms with siblings and
other relatives? Personally, I
have two holders of masters’
degrees at home, waiting for
their very first job. What can
we as parents do?
This gross waste of our
human resources potential –
which should be one of our
greatest assets – has grave
social and economic
consequences that the
government glosses over or
simply chooses to ignore.
But this is one problem it
cannot disregard. To
continue to waste the lives
of our young people this way
is not only criminal, but
ignores the impact on the
psyche and quality of leaders
of the future: Why should
our young men not be angry,
when several years after
graduation and already in
their 30s, they still have to
ask their parents for money
to pay for meat pie or a
haircut? Why should our
young women not be
irritated when despite
graduating with good grades,
they remain unemployed or
unmarried simply because
the basic ingredients for
settling down – a job and a
home are not only
unobtainable, but far from
reach?
It was with shock that I read
the reported revelation from
the Dangote Group, that in
response to the company’s
adverts for executive drivers,
about seven Ph.D holders
and thousands of master’s
degree holders were among
the 13,000 that applied for
the available 100 openings.
In other words, 1,300 people
were jostling for every single
position.
Is President Jonathan aware
of the social and economic
costs of wasting the
potentials of 20 million
youths? Does he have a plan
to tackle unemployment?
What happened to the
promises of YouWin and all
the ‘transformation’ hype he
made? Is it sensible to fritter
N2.4 trillion on his friends
and cronies in government
when Nigeria has about 90
million people who are
willing and able to work, but
about 70 million of them
cannot find productive, full-
time and paying jobs or what
to ‘manage’?
It is a shocking fact that only
about 20 million Nigerians
have sustainable and regular
jobs, out of a population of
about 162 million. This
simple statistic causes the
country a loss of about N2
trillion annually from the
absence of commercial
activities that ordinarily
should have taken place but
did not. The social cost is
unquantifiable but has short
and long term effects that
sociologists have to study.
What cannot be denied is
that the situation is doing
severe harm to the creativity
and productivity of millions
of Nigerians between the
ages of 21 and 40 years – the
future leaders of our
country, and nearly half of
its population.
It is sad that when the
performance of the Jonathan
administration is mentioned,
rather than objective
analyses of the situation
devoid of the usual
connotations, a few Nigerian
youths, who perhaps by
virtue of their proximity to
power benefit from the
mindless looting of the
nation’s treasury, distort the
discussion and sing baseless
commendations. But when
all the praises have been
sung, the hard facts still
stare back at us: millions of
our unemployed daughters,
sons, brothers and sisters –
including those entering the
workforce for the first time
and others who have lost
their jobs due to the
incompetent management of
our economy will scan the
pages of newspapers and
websites for job
advertisements, but like the
situation at Dangote reflects,
thousands of youths will
chase every available
vacancy. And as we know, it
is those connected rather
than those best qualified,
that will end up filling most
vacancies when they are
available.
Sadness turns to fear when
one ruminates on the fact
that even as the ranks of
jobless Nigerians grow, at
least three million more
unemployed people will join
them next year. At current
rates, even if government
policies, enabling
environment and direct
efforts manage to create one
million new jobs a year (an
impossibility under
Jonathan), it would take 20
years to close today’s
existing job gap. Except that
by that time, at least 60
million more Nigerians
would have joined the
workforce.
It is almost cruel to talk of
underemployment when so
many millions are
unemployed, yet we cannot
pretend that
underemployment is not a
serious concern in our
economy. This has negative
consequences on our
national productivity output.
The twin factors of
unemployment and
underemployment cause
substantial economic losses
because we are unable to
produce goods and services
for the lost millions of wage
earners, but because
unemployed people do not
earn money, that gap
remains unfilled. In most
places in the world, job
growth leads to economic
growth and vice versa, but
not in Nigeria. How can
government claim that the
economy is truly growing
when it is not creating jobs?
If the growth figures
released by government are
to be believed, Nigeria
should be creating about
three million jobs annually
which should in turn lead to
a steady decline in
unemployment and poverty.
At the moment, many
sectors capable of creating
jobs for Nigerians remain
untapped. Tourism alone can
create millions of jobs, but
which tourist will visit a
country that is as unsafe as
Nigeria? Agriculture –
potentially the largest
employer of labour- has
been left largely at
subsistence level, with
issues like infrastructure
deficits, high interest rates
affecting the sector’s value
chain. Whilst commending
the initiative to establish the
Agricultural Sector
Intervention Fund, the N200
billion was placed in interest
yielding bank accounts for a
long while, with many of
them reluctant to lend, and
to the real farmers. Yet, this
is a sector that can earn
more foreign exchange for
Nigeria than oil and save us
the trillions we spend on
food imports.
Similarly, education – where
millions of vacancies in
teaching, lecturing and
support services also exist or
can be created is still
chronically underfunded.
Worse is the fact that the
informal sector – which is
three to four times the size
of the formal economy, has
been left to its own devices
because formalization
channels are difficult to
reach – so an important
source of economic
development, employment
generation and tax revenues
remains untapped.
Unemployment is at the
heart of Nigeria’s poverty
and insecurity.
Unfortunately, the
government of President
Jonathan has consistently
failed to devise policies to
stimulate economic growth
and create jobs when he
should be taking advantage
of inadequate amenities like
clean water, education, and
health care to invest in the
required infrastructure and
human capital development
to create and retain millions
of jobs in every part of the
country and all sectors of the
economy.
Considering the huge social
and economic costs of
unemployment, a focused
government should be
raising capital expenditures
substantially – by building
more schools, roads,
bridges, water systems,
electricity stations and other
projects that create jobs.
That would be the best way
to apologize to, and salvage
the futures of the millions of
unemployed people in the
country and engage them
constructively in the
Nigerian project.
Regrettably, this
administration does not
seem to understand these
concepts, and is therefore
unable to create even a
mere 50,000 jobs every year
when it should be creating at
least three million jobs
annually, while parents like
me must shoulder the
burdens of looking after our
parents, extended families
and children for years to
come.

#CONSENSUS 2015