Worried by the increasing population of graduate job seekers in Nigeria, the Executive Secretary of National Universities Commission (NUC), Professor Julius Okogie has called on undergraduates to nurture ideas which they can turn into successful business ventures.
Professor Okogie’s call was contained in a goodwill message to the 2014 Youth Summit for undergraduates organized by the Ambassador Emmanuel Oseimiegha Otiotio (AEOO) Foundation in Abuja at the weekend.
In the message that was delivered on his behalf by the Director, Students Support Services, Mallam Ibrahim Iro Dan-Iya, Okogie said the Commission had, in collaboration with relevant stakeholders, initiated a number of entrepreneurship programmes for Nigerian undergraduates to enable them, upon graduation, become job creators rather than job seekers.
“Some of these include the Network for African Student Entrepreneurs (NASE) and the Annual National Entrepreneurship Week (ANEW) both of which are aimed at providing a plaftrom for networking and exchange of business ideas among students, promotion of entrepreneurship in the university system as well as projection of entrepreneurship to the larger society.”
Okogie said that the Youth Summit with the theme: “Aspire to Greatness” could not have come at a better time than now when the increasing rate of unemployment among Nigerian tertiary institution undergraduates and the desire to create job opportunities for the teeming youth in the country had informed government’s decision to “ensure that graduates are equipped with requisite knowledge and skills to start up small scale businesses for sustainable living while in and after school.”
He said that it is against this backdrop that the Federal Government in 2006 directed that Entrepreneurship Education should be entrenched in the curriculum of all Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in the country, “hence the NUC introduced GST Entrepreneurship as a compulsory course for all undergraduates while the B.Sc Entrepreneurship was introduced as a degree programme in 2011.”
President of the AEOO Foundation, Ambassador Otiotio commended the Federal Government’s initiatives through the NUC, pointing out that his Foundation would synergise with and complement government’s efforts at building capacities for undergraduate youths to enable them start their own small scale businesses.
Otiotio explained that this would ease pressure on the government as such small businesses would create positive multiplier effects on the economy as the businesses would be able to provide employment in the private sector.
He urged undergraduates who participated at the Youth Summit to be proactive by coming up with ideas on how to drive Federal Government’s employment creation initiatives through the NUC, assuring them that the AEOO Foundation would interface between them and the NUC.
The Youth Summit featured speakers on various perspectives of how to achieve greatness through setting up of private businesses, motivational videos, presentation by the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), dance drama on the imperativeness of national unity, mentoring sessions and presentation of business plans by the groups.
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