YOUR LIFE FOR A JOB

A somber Nigerian immigration boss told a press gathering yesterday that 45 job applicants had died following an employment screening exercise into the immigration service early this month. This staggering figure is even four times higher than original reports. The only consolation in this saga was that there was no cover up by the top echelon of the Nigerian immigration service; in any case the authorities ordered an investigation be carried out to uncover the direct and remote causes of the deaths.  While waiting for the final white paper, it is important to muse over certain things we need not a white paper to uncover. The screening exercise took place in the 6 geo political zones of the country; accounts by participants in the 6 geo-political zones of Nigeria reflected in opinion polls on newspapers, blogs and the television are unsettling. It is disheartening to note that the immigration service which ought to be a signpost and bulwark in convincing the drove of Nigerians fleeing the country’s shores in the search of the Golden Fleece could be embroiled in this fiasco. The unemployment situation in Nigeria goes beyond bland rhetoric in radio and television jingles. The immigration service has a logical question to answer; how do you allow over 100, 000 people apply for a little over 1000 job slots? The examiners I conclude must have the Wisdom of biblical king Solomon to arrive at their picks in less than two hours or how do you explain applicants scheduled for an examination at 7am stood up until 2p.m and then made to do an endurance trek for 4km; how inhumane can one be to his fellow man. What could be more enduring than an eight-hour hold-up without a breakfast and then tell me its routine procedure. This a white paper would not suffice, heads have to roll right away

Today it’s the immigration yesterday it was the banks, the only difference was that there were no loss of lives. One employment exercise in the southwestern part of Nigeria nearly turned in a fiasco when 150, 000 graduates showed up for 700 job slots. The situation got out of hand and the police quelled the bedlam with batons and tear-gas canisters. Many left the examination venues with bruises and worse-off; their dignity had been rubbished. The national directorate of employment must look critically at this anomaly where universities are churning out graduates by the thousand to meet insufficient employment slots. First things first let’s get the skilled sector up and running and then tell me about any white paper.

Jennifer,CONNECTAFRICA