Report: Few Unemployed Youths Benefit from Govt’s Safety Nets

Omolabake Fasogbon
Not up to 1 per cent of over 50 per cent unemployed youths population in Nigeria have been able to access support from government’s social safety net structures which are set up to cushion effects of poverty and unemployment.

Moreover, religious bodies where the unemployed fall back on for relief after facing denial in government’s net have proven unproductive, forcing many youths to resort to ‘side hustle’ to survive.

In its 2022 recent report, West Africa’s online job platform, Jobberman further reckoned that limited coverage and weak targeting of social interventions, amongst others may have denied a larger percentage of youths due access.

Noting that Nigeria’s increasing unemployment rate on a yearly average of six percent was worrying, with a far -reaching effects, Chief Executive Officer of Jobberman, Oreoluwa Boboye said it was high time that youths shifted their priority away from white collar job and develop their side hustle to main job.

On his part, Managing Director of Sterling Bank Limited, Abubakar Suleiman in his keynote address wants the youths to rely less on government for job but to start thinking out of the box.

To him, government is not set up to create jobs, but to enable job creation.
Like Boboye, CEO of The Africa Talent Company (parent company of Jobberman), Hilda Kragha stressed the need for youth to develop and repackage their side hustle as a means of livelihood.