Source: http://ww2.guardiannewsngr.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=14411:nigeria-graduates-are-unemployable-says-group&catid=54:campus&Itemid=568For 28-year Kayode Lawal, who assumed that after graduating from the Lagos State University with a Second Class Upper in Marketing, getting a job would be pretty easy was disappointed five years ago, when that dream was not realised. He now works with a soap manufacturing company at Mile Two, as a factory worker.
According to him, with his over 100 application letters to different companies and countless interviews attended, he has still not got his dream job.
It has been observed the world over that the unemployment rate among young people is rising. According to the International Labour Office (ILO), an estimated 85 million men and women are currently unemployed, with nearly 25 per cent losing their jobs over the last five years. In Nigeria, youths form the bulk of the unemployed. This leaves many wondering where graduates of various tertiary institutions in the country would work.
Concerned with this disturbing trend, Nigeria Graduate Advancement Programme (NGAP) is moving to stem the tide through seminars in tertiary institutions across the country, to improve the employment capacity of graduates.
Speaking at a workshop organised at Federal College of Education, Akoka, Lagos, President of NGAP, Oyida Alfred, said, “from our research and available statistics, the major problem in Nigeria is not the non-availability of jobs, but the alarming rate of unemployable graduates in the labour market.”
As a Human Resource Consultant with over 15 years experience, Alfred noted that unemployable is a situation, where an individual lacks the basic mental, social, practical and developmental skills that will enable him or her to function effectively at assigned jobs and handle everyday's work challenges.
She said, “NGAP, is committed to developing strategies and offer relevant resources that will activate competency building, among young Nigerian workforce.”
On strategies employed to achieve the vision, she stated are focusing on helping undergraduates gain work experience through graduate attachment programmes and organising seminars in universities, with the aim to solve the skill gap problem, while the individual is still in his formative years.”
