One in every two Nigerians in the country’s labour force is either unemployed or underemployed. That grim statistics was one of the key highlights of the latest unemployment report published by Nigeria’s Bureau of Statistics, which shows the most recent data as of Q2 2020.
While Nigeria’s unemployment rate has climbed to 27.1% (up from 23.1% in Q3 2018, when the unemployment report was last published), the country’s underemployment rate which reflects those working less than 40 hours a week, or in jobs that underutilise a person’s skills, time, or education has increased to 28.6%.
With a labour force of 80.2 million, that means about 21.7 million Nigerians are unemployed, a figure that exceeds the population of 35 of Africa’s 54 countries. Among young Nigerians aged between 25 and 34, the largest bloc of the labour force, the unemployment rate currently stands even higher, at 30.7%.
Read Also: Imo Records Highest Rate Of Unemployment As NBS Releases Statistics
The report is particularly damning for the administration of Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari, which has struggled to deliver economic policies to drive growth and create jobs. The unemployment rate has more than tripled since Buhari first took office in May 2015.
Imo State has an unemployment rate of 48.7% as at the second quarter of 2020, by far the highest when compared to any other state in the country. According to the data, 75.1% of the total employable people in the state are either underemployed or unemployed.
- Total number of employable people – 2.48 million
- Fully employed people – 618, 481
- Unemployed people in the state – 593. 347
- Underemployed – 656, 394
Imo State is largely a civil service town and has been unlucky with State Governors over the last 20 years. Private sector jobs are hard to come by in the serene state with most industries setting up show in nearby cities like Aba, Port Harcourt, and Onitsha.
Many have wondered why Imo State is the unemployment centre of the nation. They have argued that it means that the government in Imo State, over the years, has done a more terrible job than the governments in the rest of the country. But despite the terrible governments, that does not explain their lead in the unemployment market.
Imo state is top in the unemployment statistics because of one of major reason. The overspill of students from tertiary institutions.
Imo state has one of the largest concentration of Tertiary institutions in the country, with three Universities, one Federal College of Education, two polytechnics and numerous vocational institutions.
Imo state graduates the most students from universities but due to infrastructural deficiency, there is little or no opportunities for them to secure jobs or create jobs for themselves. Some other states don’t have means of employment or business opportunities but they don’t have large entrants into the employment market. If you graduate an average of 4,000 young men and women from the universities every year and your industries and commercial outfits can only employ 500 and another state graduates 2,000 and can employ 100 persons, you have a higher unemployment rate.
The demand and supply of employable persons determine the unemployment rates.
In Imo State, like other states’ focus for employment has been on civil service jobs as there are few commercial and industrial activities. The reason is that governance in Imo states has been political rather than entrepreneurial. Imo state is not a major entrepreneurial state. An entrepreneurial state is one that drives investment and productivity as a business would, so as to enhance efficient production.
The last of Entrepreneurial governance was during the tenure of the late Dr Michael Okpara in the defunct Eastern Region when Imo state became the fastest growing economy in the world. Okpara established several cottage industries and commercial outfits. In one fell swoop, Internally Generated Revenue grew astronomically such that Okpara believed that if Nigeria followed the vision, it could reach the GDP and per capita levels of developed economies in less than 15 years. Because Okpara understood the principles of economic development and social transformation, he was able to create wealth and jobs through efficient public sector leadership. He did not wait for the nonexistent private sector to drive development. Like the East Asian leaders, he understood the concept of a developmental state and utilised all-natural resources in a sustainable manner to create wealth and jobs.
The Imo State Government can and should replicate the late Okpara’s vision in Imo State and the former Eastern Region. The same structure and resources remain, the only things missing are the knowledge and character in individuals and the readiness to work and capitalise.
To solve the high unemployment evidenced in the state, the Imo State Government needs two strategic actions. First, it needs to go back to cottage industries across the state and the region. Establishing cottage industries in every quarter in every LGA in Imo State would employ at least 100-150 persons. This will cater to the unskilled and semi-skilled young men and women.
Again, the government should encourage the establishment of ICT and Innovation incubation centres to enable highly skilled and educated youths to attract digital jobs across the world. This activity, supplemented with entrepreneurial training and financial support, will help many to develop new start-ups. With about 99% literacy and high-quality human capital, Imo State should be Africa’s capital of start-ups.
Imo state needs this twin approach to deal with unemployment in Imo State: cottage industries for low skills and high-end digital hubs for high skills. But you first need a focused government that is stable and democratic. Okpara got this right when he urged Nigeria to develop consensual governance that will enable rapid economic development. Governor Hope Uzodinma should step up and take to his oars and lift Imo state out of this terrible state of unemployment.
THE EASTERN UPDATES
