Jobs, jobs, jobs (1)

Iwas the keynote speaker at an economic dialogue on Nigeria organised by Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) and the Delegation of German Industry and Commerce in Nigeria (AHK) in the week just past (23 May 2019). Titled “Road to Economic Development : Challenges and Opportunities”, the dialogue was aimed at shaping the priorities of the incoming second administration of President Muhammadu Buhari.

On the panel afterwards, moderated by Marc Lucassen of AHK and Vladimir Krech of KAS, were Obadiah Mailafia, former deputy governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN), Onyeche Tifase, chief executive of the Nigerian subsidiary of Siemens, the German industrial conglomerate, Olaf Schmuser, senior representative of the Commerzbank franchise in Nigeria,

and myself.

I started my speech with the one issue that is undoubtedly uppermost on the minds of Nigerians at this time: Jobs!

We have a jobs crisis in Nigeria. As I recall, during the 2019 election campaigns, when it became quite clear the prosperity messaging of “jobs” by the main opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) was resonating with the populace, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) changed its broad emphasis on what it likely saw as an array of achievements in fighting corruption and building infrastructure, for instance, to one of how many jobs it had created in the past four years.

How is it possible that we have a jobs crisis with only about a quarter of the labour force not employed, you probably wonder? At 23 percent, the unemployment rate would probably be considered relatively mild; if our challenging circumstances are considered.

There is nothing wrong with the statistics. Because when the underemployment rate of 20 percent is added to the unemployment rate of 23 percent, totalling 43 percent, the statistics reveals what comes close to what you and I probably see and feel on the proverbial “streets”.

43 percent of the labour force is without a full-time job or any job