ON LAZY NIGERIAN YOUTHS: Let the elders give way

HARBINGER COMMENT
ON April 17, 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari at the  Commonwealth Business Forum in Westminster, London, made a statement about youths' attitudes which caused ripples and negative public reactions. At the Forum, President Buhari said: “We have a very young population; our population is estimated conservatively to be 180 million. More than 60 percent of the population is below the age of 30. A lot of them have not been to school and they are claiming that Nigeria is an oil-producing country, therefore they should sit and do nothing and get housing, health care, and education free.”
The public complained bitterly about the comment. They stated that the only way to prove President Buhari wrong is by using their Permanent Voters’ Card, PVC, in the right way so that incoming leaders will mind their statements, especially on sensitive issues. While some people did not see it as a harmless statement. Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, said the President’s comment did not apply to all Nigerian youths. He said the reaction on the President’s comment was the handiwork of detractors.
The Harbinger Magazine sees this statement as a clarion call for all the articulated Nigerian youths who have an innovative spirit, very hardworking, resilient, determined, and industrious which any nation could be proud to have. Nigerian youths are not lazy, they were only disappointed by some past leaders who have been recycling themselves in the corridor of power because they acquired the country's resources for themselves and their families. Nigerian youths have been squeezed by some lazy and greedy leaders who have ruined the future of this nation and refused to give way to the younger ones in governance.
Despite the fact that Nigerian youths were denied social amenities and employment opportunities, they are not lazy. They engage themselves in various activities such as football, music, and entertainment to survive. In the markets, our youths are enterprising. Even inside traffic, our youths are running after moving vehicles to sell pure water, gala, plantain-chips, yogurts etc. They are also pushing wheelbarrows and carts, all to survive hardship caused by bad leadership. It shows that if such youths have an opportunity, they will get established as businesspersons of repute. Even those that are employed are either poorly paid or owed salaries. This makes some youths lost in the system that only favours the rich and relatives of influential people. The employed youths pay tax from their minimum income, pay rent, take care of their immediate family and extended family members and at the end of the day, go begging to make ends meet. The Nigerian government has not been fair to the youths. Some youths were not given requisite education especially those in the Northern Region and were sent out to become Almajiris and grow up on the streets as urchins who eventually become easy tools in the hands of politicians and terrorists. Every year, our youths are graduating from high institutions without jobs. Only those from privileged backgrounds get jobs. Every year, the government claims to provide employment for youths, yet unemployment persists. The Harbinger calls on Nigerian youths to see the President’s statement as a  wake-up call to prove their doggedness that they can do well in any responsibility saddled with them and prepare to take over from the elders that have been parading themselves in the corridor of power for long. The few ones that are waiting for the golden opportunity should buckle up and join other hardworking youths to prove to the elders that they are capable of handling any assigned role successfully