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Mohammed’s book offers solution to youth unemployment

By Florence Utor
15 January 2015   |   11:00 pm
UNEMPLOYMENT has become a worldwide problem and everyone is looking in all directions to find solutions to it. Nigeria’s Olotu Mohammed has lent his weight to resolving this problem through his book, What I Would Do If Unemployed, which he recently launched.   As the author’s personal insight into the root causes of youth unemployment,…

UNEMPLOYMENT has become a worldwide problem and everyone is looking in all directions to find solutions to it. Nigeria’s Olotu Mohammed has lent his weight to resolving this problem through his book, What I Would Do If Unemployed, which he recently launched.

  As the author’s personal insight into the root causes of youth unemployment, the book provides a roadmap on how youths can marshal their energies towards actualizing and fulfilling their dreams. It also acts as a useful guide to solving one of society’s maladies.

  Mohammed said, “Statistics, according to National Labour Organization 2013, revealed over 200 million youths were unemployed at that moment and they projected that by the year 20/20, 600 million jobs will be needed to solve the problem of unemployment. So, basically, that is what gave me the motivation to find a workable solution that would be used to the youths.”

  With youth always dreaming of landing white-collar jobs, would they appreciate and follow his instructions to become self-employed? Olotu said, “If the situation hits a man very well, nobody will tell you what to do. When the youths face the reality, they will come back to learn those things that they have ignored which is part of a valid system which could make them employable and one way or the other help them in their various aspiration.”

  Continuing, he said, “The good thing about the book is that it has provided a means for everybody regardless of your back ground, no matter how poor the family background you are coming from, the book has provided a workable solution for you. All you need is the determination to follow the guidelines that will help you as an individual. The only problem is that it may take you a longer time coming from a poor background but at the end of the day you will definitely succeed.”

  Mohammed also advised that government should make the book available to the youths at no cost and organise seminars during which the principles can be explained better to them.

  Commending the author’s effort, Assistant Director and Head of Press and Public Relations (NYSC), Lagos State, Mrs. Belinda Faniyi, said, “We are all aware that the country we live in today and even globally, unemployment has become a big issue, which has overwhelmed the Federal Government. Every Nigerian should work towards addressing this issue among our youth. I work in an organization where we deal with youth in the limit of thirty years but that is not to say those that are 18, 19 and 20 can not be unemployed. We deal with those who have passed through tertiary institution but there are those who have not even seen the four walls of a tertiary institution but have the problem of unemployment.

  “So, what I tell the youths is that they should not rely on their certificates but look for something that they are passionate about and I believe for every individual, God has planted a talent and they need to identify that talent. Once they do they should start to develop the skill. Mohammed read engineering but today he is a writer; there are many other people who studied one thing or the other but today they are into other things they are passionate about and feel can put food on the table.

  “We have some lawyers who are tailors today; it does not mean that when you acquire such skills, you become a nobody in the society. What we can do with our hands matters a lot. Rome was not built in a day; you can start small and grow into a big enterprise.”

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