Amid recession, Nigeria employs 200,000 new graduates

By Rafiu Ajakaye

LAGOS, Nigeria (AA) – Nigeria on Monday released a list of 200,000 new university graduates to be offered jobs under a two-year “paid volunteering program” aimed at cutting youth unemployment.

However, the country’s opposition has hit out at the relatively low monthly salaries the jobs will pay.

The list, published online, reveals beneficiaries spread across the country's 36 states and the capital, Abuja.

Employees -- deployed as teachers, agricultural workers or health officials -- will earn around $95 a month, above the country's monthly minimum wage of $57, government spokesman Laolu Akande said late on Sunday ahead of the release.

“All together, the [scheme] will engage and train 500,000 young unemployed graduates. It is a paid volunteering program of a two-year duration that engages graduates in their immediate communities, where they will assist in improving the inadequacies in the education, health and agriculture sectors,” Akande added.

However, although the pay rates have been criticized by the opposition, the government described it as “better than nothing” as Nigeria battles economic recession.

The country’s monetary policy committee began two days of meetings on Monday, confronted by rising inflation -- now at a record 18.33 percent and a festering foreign exchange crisis.

Nigeria has a youth unemployment/under-employment rate of 42.24 percent and a national unemployment rate of 13.3 percent, according to National Bureau of Statistics’ data from August.

The scheme is projected to inject a little above $19 million into the economy every month, beginning from December when the new employees start work.

Nigeria's government says it is part of a state social investment plan -- a key part of President Muhammadu Buhari’ s election campaign promises. Buhari had vowed to create three million jobs within four years.