NYSC Reforms

Ever since the election violence there is the question should NYSC stay of should they stop the programme? Most votes now go for keep it but change it. Make it less military and more social and use it as a proper preparation for future work or business. So now there are reforms in the NYSC, The minister of Youth Development who is responsible for NYSC, as it is a parastatal of his Ministry, says it has to become more responsive to the national needs. He mentioned that all staff of NYSC needs to get on board of ‘the transformation train’ as it is now starting to move.

The reason why it was set up after the Biafran war was to create unity and understanding of all cultures in Nigeria and prevent any such thing as the Biafran war from happening again. The Corpers, the young graduates that are serving for the mandatory year, had to come to training camps where they got a introduction training, after the three weeks they are based at different organisations, their primary assignment, where they have to do some kind of internship. Most of these interships are not well organized and leave the corpers to do nothing, which results in corpers not showing up and wasting one year. Next to this primary assignment they have to do community development work and with this they can win awards, some of the awards give them employment, or a better chance to employment, straight after the NYSC-year. Some corpers belief in working hard for these awards others leave it like it is as they expect it to be a corruptive election anyway.

Now with the reforms the NYSC should become more dynamic, responsive and relevant to the nation and the future of the corpers. How they are going to arrange this is a big question mark. They did expand their administrative structure, they got more directors, but do they know what they have to do? Do they have a new strategic plan? How is this massive organization going to change? I think NYSC is one of the biggest employers in Nigeria. So many people are working in the headquarters and all state and local government offices. It is incredible. 

One thing I know and that is that VSO is now writing a plan to at least make a small difference on education and agriculture. The NGVP that I am working on will be different in the future, we are planning to implement it in the traditional service year. During the introduction the new Corpers are encouraged to attend one of the special schemes, one of those will be the NGVP scheme from October. We will recruit the best motivated and best skilled for our NGVP to support schools and communities in education and farming. As Bola and I are working on the proposal now it starts to look like a realistic scheme for which we should be able to get funds.

Only if not for the full harted ‘NO, we cannot work with VSO on NGVP’ from the Director General(DG) I would have full confident. The NO was to be clear for the NGVP post-NYSC as it is now. So for the current programme we have to find good funders quickly. However for the new NGVP as een in-service scheme in the mandatory NYSC year I still have hope. An not only I have hope also Mrs Awakasien, my counterpart within NYSC. After the meeting she got appointed as new assistant director for national volunteering, which give a bit of hope that the DG is willing to look into that. I guess he didn’t hear this part of Kenna’s story when she was introducing the reason for the meeting.

As it comes now to the end of my placement I hope it will all be okay next year, at least for the new NGVP. How it will all work out for the old one I don’t know as I have the idea that multitasking is not the best in this place.