I had just put off the generator set on Saturday night and was desperately struggling to get some sleep alas it was all futile effort because the hotness of my room after the fan stopped rolling was unbearable. I reached out for the plastic hand fan under my pillow and began the exhilarating exercise of fanning myself to sleep as have been my modus operandi in the last two weeks. Electricity supply had been at its poorest peaks and the recent unfathomable hike in fuel price and scarcity of the product has reduced drastically the hours the generator set could stay on. I tossed and turned on my bed fanning myself vigorously and cursing in my mind “which kind country be this? Na this be the 18 hours of power supply wey government promise us? Fuel sef them don become gold, I hissed at the thoughts cascading through my mind and the frustration I was beginning to feel as I was being deprived of a much needed good night’s rest, a mobile phone sound pulled me out of reverie, I reached out and picked up my phone from the other side of the bed with a frown but as I saw the caller ID, it melted into a smile, it was my aunt calling though I wondered why she was calling that late into the night, I hit the green button to find out and immediately, her voice filled my ears but it wasn’t her usual cheerful voice, she sounded sober and withdrawn but spoke urgently “ you dey watch channels”? I replied evenly with “no, we no get light” then she went silent for a while and continued this time in our ijaw dialete, “mi country mi sei boh (meaning, the situation of this country has deteriorated)! Imagine; see as them waste people children lives, Tamarau! She exclaimed. I sat up on my bed and probed further with great agitation, “aunty, wetin happen? who die? Na Boko Haram again abi?. She was moved to tears as she replied several minutes later giving me a load down of the tragedy that took place at the Nigerian Immigration Service recruitment centers nationwide. The horror, the sorrow I couldn’t contain myself as I busted out screaming. All that kept hitting my mind hard were the following words, “it could have been you!” We talked for a few minutes more and she hung up but for me I knew that sleep had eluded me that night. I laid on my bed and immediately got online. What I saw was inexplicable, the National Stadium in Abuja was filled beyond capacity, and I began to wonder if it was a recruitment exercise or another African Nations Cup? My heart shank, I palpitated and began to sweat profusely, this could have happened to me! I kept scrolling down and looking at the pictures pasted online and my heart broke the more as I put to use my mind’s eye and imagined the pushing and pulling, the stampede, the shouts and screams for help and the eventual silence and finally death of these youths all for what? Employment! Something went off in my head and I got furious because trust me I could totally relate to the scenario as I myself have being in similar situations more than once. Yes, I can assure you this is not the first time thronging and stampede had occurred at an employment seeking center because I have been at the receiving end not only once though, I had never seen it result into the untimely death of innocent youths. I have been an unemployed graduate for some years now so believe me when I tell you I related to the news on a personal level. I didn’t just see it as a bunch of people getting walked over and losing their lives, I imagined it as though it happened to me. In March 2012, I was at Port Harcourt for Diamond Bank’s aptitude test. It was done in batches but that day I swore never to repeat that exercise. I was pushed, pulled and even my hair was tugged at until a line of weavon that had been securely glued on came off. I felt like my scalp was been pulled out and what was worst, It wasn’t even successful! In September that same year, I attended a job fair at the national arts theatre Iganmu, Lagos with a lot of hopes and expectation that were dashed momentarily. The population of job seekers at the job fair was unbelievable. It was supposed to be a closed job fair only for 1500 youths who had gone through the World Bank sponsored 10 weeks training for employability in the service sector (ACCESS NIG) but to my astonishment, the place was filled up and as usual, a stampede occurred. I was in the middle of the crowd and was literally swept off my feet and that is no romantic expression, I mean I was lifted off the ground as a result of the pushing from behind and I couldn’t feel both my legs! That was not all I watched helplessly as we were pushed through a glass door, crashing into the glass and coming off on the other side. It was like an action movie, the lady directly in front of me was cut badly by the glass and was bleeding from head to toe; I miraculously came onto the other side, uninjured. I could go on and on but I do not intend to make myself the centre of this article. The truth is, it is not about me but about the thousands of Nigerian Youths that are treated as savages with no respect and dignity having gone through the tedious four walls of the academia. It is about the innocent children who hold the promise of future leadership but are forced to go engage in social vices because all their efforts to secure a genuine job go into flames. It is about a generation of youths that are supposed to liberate their families from poverty but end up miserably being trodden upon like insects.
I write this with a shattered heart and a distraught spirit, how long shall we remain in this ring around the rose’s situation where there is no head way. We talk and talk about these things but that doesn’t change anything. The statistic for unemployment in the country is sky rocketing but the height of this malady is when the youth, who are supposed to be tomorrow’s leaders are made sacrificial lambs over uncertainty. Mr. President in his benevolence and profound love for citizenry has mandated that three members each of the deceased families should be recruited by the National Immigration Service and I applaud the initiative but a number of questions still perturb my sleep every night like exorcised fiends, will that eliminate or mitigate the unemployment as a national problem, will that bring back the 22 youths that met with an abrupt end of their lives on Saturday while in search of employment, what if there were the only literate people in their immediate nuclear family, what if no other people are qualified to take those positions in the home of the deceased. What we need is total rejuvenation and not some patching. What then gives us the guarantee that something similar or perhaps worst would not be occurring anytime soon.
