Kaduna State deputy governor Hadiza Balarabe has admonished Nigerian graduates to continue to pursue education and capacity-building to enable them have strong social and economic footing in today’s changing world.
The deputy governor who stated this in her address to the corps members of NYSC Batch B Steam 2, at the closing of their orientation course yesterday in Kaduna pointed out that traditional jobs in the public and private sectors are no longer available thus only graduates with higher emotional and social quotients are able to find their footings in the fast-changing world.
She said though certificates do not necessarily provide bread, good education will prepare them for social and economic navigation of the society.
The deputy governor further said the purpose of the orientation course prepared for NYSC corps members was to prepare them for the primary responsibility of the scheme.
“It is along this line that I encourage young people to continue to seek educational opportunities so that they can be better placed to grapple with the upheavals tossed up by modernism.
“You were, therefore, equipped with the basics of the local language and culture, to enable you live by. You have also been instilled with capacities for endurance and discipline which you need to succeed during the service year.”
Balarabe who described the youths as the most productive sector of Nigeria’s demography, explains that Nigeria’s population is dominated by youths with a median age of the country being 18.4 years.
Citing a new World Bank report, the deputy governor said 74 per cent of global growth of youth population aged 18–23 will be in Nigeria and nine other countries up to 2035.
She called on the corps members to take their host communities as their home and to uphold the lessons of unity and service to the fatherland in their areas of primary assignments.
While commending the NYSC for the success of the orientation course, she pledged Kaduna State Government’s continued support to the NYSC scheme for the attainment of its noble objectives of promoting national unity and cohesion.
