SUSTAINING THE NYSC SCHEME

The cheerful sun unveiled the beauty of the sky one Sunday morning, with brilliant smiles and out poured the un-festooned happiness in our home-another graduate and a soon-to-be “federal pikin” has just emerged. 

My father broke the cocoon of sleep and staggered awake to my room that night. We sat together in the balcony of our house drinking the balmy morning air, him swimming in the sea of his memories. Then it came. 

The memory of his days in Bauchi state as a corps member. It was a prezzie from him to me and I savoured it all.

“We were regarded as gods and almost revered,” he said, feeling as though he was swimming in a great shining lake, dazzled by the sun.

“Everywhere we went, the people showered us with so much love such that I even forgot that I wasn’t in my father’s house. They were ready to put their lives on the line just to make sure that no harm comes our way.”

I was staggered by this piece of information and in high spirits joined thousands of Nigerian graduates in the service to Nigeria-our fatherland. I was hoping that what my father told me still holds true until it hit me like a punch from Floyd Mayweather, Jr.

My first week in the national sojourn cooked my goose. What really happened? I asked no one in particular.

Let’s swerve upfront a little bit. the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) was established by the military decree N0. 24 of 1973 and was later revoked and modified by the Decree N0. 51 of 16^th June, 1993 with the aim of posting corps members to states and regions other than theirs so that they could learn the customs and traditions of their host community, thus ameliorating the political and socio-economic maladies that bedeviled the development and growth of the nation, thirty months after the debilitating  debris of the civil war.

Frankly speaking, there is no single stanchion of unity in the nation that has done so awesomely in preparing the youths towards becoming good national examples for other citizens, grooming graduate youths for the promotion of national cohesion, national integration, sustainable developments in rural communities and self reliance. None.

The NYSC scheme has tenaciously done noble in its mission to save the nation from any form of collapse but the Nigerian society of today makes it look so glaring that less of this objective has been achieved. Nigerians still consider where they come from paramount before talking about Nigeria as a country or other ethnic groups.

Good as the foundation of the NYSC is, it is not yet time to scream uhuru because all is not well. There are pitfalls grappling the scheme which need urgent attention.

These days, equal rights and privileges are not given during mobilization. While those who are connected to the high and mighty are sent to cities of their choice, others are left to the vagary of chances and adding to this is the operations and increasing sophistication of the attack by BokoHaram. No graduate wants to dare the northern region. Even those posted to this region pull every stunt to get themselves redeployed.

 The way corps members are treated in some places is disheartening. Rather than make life comfortable for these corps members as it were, people, schools, government agencies, private and public companies see them as cheap labourers. They use and dump them, and after which, eighty per cent of them join their colleagues in the endless search for unavailable jobs.

The welfare of every corps member should be paramount. Their monthly allowance is nothing to write home about considering the stiff economic hardship. They deserve better take-homes because they work harder than even some of the staff. In some schools for example, corps members make up a considerable number of the staff and do their job with utmost diligence.

The deplorable state of basic amenities in some orientation camps leaves nothing to be desired at all. In a civilised society, a rancher cannot even subject his animals to such unwholesome environments. Some of these camps are typical examples of the Nigerian prisons and corps members seeking to serve their fatherland and perhaps are kept in such places for the three weeks forced holiday. This is quite unfair.

Camps that needs face lifts should be renovated and conducive accommodations made available for both the corps members and the camp officials who sweat it out day and night to make sure that the spirit of patriotism is en-grained in the corps members.

Adequate security for all corps members should be guaranteed. This off course should be a tripartite arrangement.  Both the federal, state, local government authorities and even the local community should strive to make sure that all corps members residing in their domain are safe from harm. The NYSC should, as a matter of sound reasoning, stop mobilizing corps members to volatile regions where even the government have not succeeded in providing adequate security for the inhabitants.

Finally, it takes two hands to get a clap. The corps members also have a stake to play in festering the purview of the NYSC scheme. In making sure that all the objectives of the NYSC is achieved. They should be dedicated to service and jettison primordial interests and sentiments. They should eschew all tribal and religious divide and hold on to Nigeria as one insoluble nation and by this the efforts of the managements of the scheme will not be in vain.