Welcome to Nigeria where virtually every notable government ministry, agency, or Parastatal has remained a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for the raping of Nigeria’s resources. Many of these institutions which were created with lofty goals in mind have surrendered themselves to the whims and caprices of the thieving Nigerian political elite class. Rather than serve the purpose for which they were instituted for Nigerians, they have all merely served the purpose of their corrupt masters who think nothing good about the country whose resources they have continually plundered.
The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) has over the years effectively proven to be one of these highly dependable SPVs to the Nigerian political elite that have merely served as conduit pipes for the siphoning of Nigeria’s common patrimony.
The fraudulent scheme was instituted by General Yakubu Gowon in 1973 and exactly years after it was set up as part of a central youth development program for Nigerians since independence the general position of the same demography of young people has only continued to progressively deteriorate. Unemployment, economic power, educational attainment, social cohesion, civic engagement, social security, and individual tolerance which all form some of the reasons for which the NYSC scheme was put together have remained illusory five decades later.
The NYSC scheme has clearly shown itself to be an avenue for many corrupt Nigerians to enrich themselves because there’s no hard evidence from empirical data or broad observation that points to the conclusion that the scheme is a positive endeavor by any means. Every year, the largely unproductive scheme costs the cash-strapped Nigerian government billions of Naira to fund and there is nothing on the ground to corroborate such reckless spending.
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One of the most commonly proposed arguments in support of the program is that the scheme compels young people who are members of the diverse Nigerian population to mingle and interact with each other, thereby learning and becoming more tolerant of their differences. However, that argument is faulty because it is simplistic to assume that mere exposure to differences will foster understanding and tolerance in a country where those differences are deliberately mischaracterised. The people propounding this argument have failed to realise that nationhood is actually a contract that every participant needs to voluntarily subscribe to be able to freely navigate through it. The social contract is defined by a constitution and laws that apply to everyone equally, and the sub-national agenda must always be subordinate. Where a particular section of the country is treated like kings and the other section as slaves, mere exposure to each other will more likely amplify strife and social distance. Unity by fiat is a mirage; people need to navigate their relationships organically, motivated by incentives and personal utility.
The NYSC scheme has failed to meet the expectations of Nigerians by any means and yet, has remained very active in plundering the resources of the country. The big question is that if it were put together to invigorate unity and foster cohesion among Nigerians and have comprehensively failed in that regard, why then is the scheme still in place in the country today? Who reinforces failure?
To make matters worse, the NYSC scheme is also leaving permanent injuries on the Nigerian polity. During their one-year assignments, many of the participants in the scheme are often posted to schools and primary healthcare centers as a cosmetic solution to the inadequacies in the sectors in terms of manpower. This has done great harm to the educational and healthcare sectors in the country because if schools and clinics have to rely on untrained, unmotivated, and temporary staff, it is difficult to expect any positive long-term outcomes from them. There is absolutely no positive effect of the scheme that has not proven to be counterproductive.
Not even the private sector has been spared the brunt of the scheme because research has shown that organisations simply exploit and underpay graduates for a year before deciding whether or not they should be recycled or retained. There is no data to show how the NYSC improves graduate placement, what percentage of youth corps members are retained by their private-sector employers, or what percentage decides to stay and integrate into locations far away from home. So what benefit is the scheme to Nigerians?
The NYSC will have been scrapped if it hadn’t been used by a section of the Nigerian elites to siphon the resources of the country. Come to think of it, does it mean there is no better way to engage Nigerian graduates than 3 weeks of paramilitary boot camps which is immediately followed by one year of compelled national service? How does the highly insensitive Nigerian government find the courage to employ every graduate for one year at minimum wage without 50 years of empirical evidence validating the tangible benefits of incurring that cost if the scheme was not merely a special purpose vehicle for looting?
A look at the 2023 budget will show that the NYSC scheme and the Universal Basic Education Commission have almost the same amount of budgetary allocations. A look at the breakdown of those figures shows that the NYSC will expend about N28 billion on kits and feeding alone! The total budgetary allocation for the scheme this year alone is about N126bn. The big question Nigerians should be asking is, why can’t the government invest these sums into the education sector to improve the quality of education these so-called graduates receive before coming to take part in the scheme?
The truth is that doing something and pretending to be succeeding at the same thing for 50 years without success is plain insanity and bare-faced hypocrisy. The time is ripe for Nigeria to scrap such a wasteful scheme that only lines the pockets of the people who run it and doesn’t add any to the Nigerian Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
The NYSC scheme has clearly outlived its usefulness and importance if it had any, it has failed abysmally to achieve its intended purpose and there is no reason why it shouldn’t be discarded and flung out of the window as one of the remnants of military dictatorships in the country.
Rather than wasting the time of everybody and looting the resources of the country in the end, it will be more beneficial to Nigerians, if every graduate in the country is given the option to participate in a one-month orientation camp where he or she will be thought strategic leadership, economics, and other useful skills and at the end of the exercise, the current one-year stipend is paid to them in full as startup grant. The truth remains that no matter how one chooses to sugarcoat it, the current NYSC structure is docile and irrelevant to today’s world and Nigerians must now add their voice in calling for its scrap.
