Entrepreneurship, intrapreneurship and youth employment in Nigeria

Despite political independence from Great Britain on October 1, 1960 and its rich, abundant human and material resources, Nigeria has been struggling hard to become a force to be reckoned with among comity of nations. To move forward, the country needs to take a look at critical issues germane to national development, some of which were brought to the fore by a former Deputy Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Tunde Lemo, while delivering the convocation lecture at the 28th and 29th Combined Convocation Ceremonies of the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Ogun State titled, “Nigerian Youths: Opportunities for Gainful Employment In spite of Economic Circumstances”, at the Oluwafemi Balogun Ceremonial Building of the 34-year-old specialised institution.

Lemo noted that many people are unsure of what the future holds for young graduates, especially now that the situation in the country is completely different from what was experienced about 40 years ago when top employers of labour such as oil companies and top international accounting firms would usually visit campuses and arrange for interviews for brilliant students and got job offers, even before they proceeded for the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, but today “Many young people have lost hope. While some have left for other countries in Europe and the Americas mainly, many in Nigeria are pursuing the foolish and deadly get-rich-quick options like yahoo, yahoo plus, ritual killings, kidnapping, armed robbery and hard drugs, to mention a few”.

In the 25-page convocation lecture, he defined entrepreneurship as the capacity and willingness to develop and organise a business venture along with its inherent risks in order to make profit. Hence, entrepreneurs strive to meet the social, economic and developmental needs of their environment. On the other hand, relying on the American Heritage Dictionary, he described an intrapreneur as someone within a large organisation, who takes direct responsibility for turning an idea into a profitable and finished product through assertive risk-taking and innovation. Hence, intrapreneurs behave like entrepreneurs, only that they operate within defined boundaries of a corporate environment. Lemo, a first class accounting graduate of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka and Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN), and Chartered Institute of Bankers (CIBN) gave examples of individuals, who have flourished from intrapreneurial activities.

They include the founders of Adobe Systems Incorporation, John Warnock and Charles Geschke, employees of Xerox, who were allegedly frustrated because their new product ‘Adobe’ was not encouraged after which they quit Xerox in the early 1980s to begin their own business and that today, Adobe’s market capitalisation is $219 billion, amounting to the world’s 44th most valuable by market capitalisation. He added that intrapreneurial activities are also found within government circles by pioneering ideas and changing the way government does business for effectiveness and efficiency. The lecturer lamented that nearly 60% of those that are unemployed are youth, between the ages of 15-24 and mainly graduates, saying youth unemployment is like a ticking time bomb, even though many people believe that Nigerian graduates are unemployable due to lack of employability skills, and failure of school curriculum to place emphasis on practical concept of entrepreneurship, among other reasons.

Lemo, an Officer of the Order of the Federal Republic (OFR) and Chairman, Federal Emergency Road Maintenance Agency (FERMA), makes a case for vocational training, skills development and work experience to enhance the employability of such young people while there must be intense interaction between the Town and Gown, relevant institutional frameworks and capacity should be put in place to enable young people have access to information and knowledge that can help them navigate the labour market, and having job-friendly policies and demand-side measures that can help young people gain valuable work experience, just to mention a few. He explained that the apex bank (CBN) continues to sustain its interventions in priority sectors and segments of the economy with potential for delivering economic growth, job creation, food and industrial raw materials self-sufficiency, and economic diversification in various sectors.

The accountant-cum-banker also talked about the Boost Africa joint initiative, between the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the European Investment Bank (EIB) aimed at harnessing the continent’s potential and creating opportunities as well as enhancing entrepreneurship and innovation across Africa, overall target size across the various components of the initiative is expected to be around €250 million, leveraging €1 billion in investments, supporting 1,500 SMEs, creating 25,000 direct jobs and at least 70,000 indirect jobs. He agrees that there are enormous prospects for the growth and development of entrepreneurship as a vehicle for national development while observing that Nigeria’s huge population provides a virile market and dominant role in the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) region that accounts for 40% contribution to the body, as of 2020.

Not only that, it allows for natural resource endowment because Nigeria is blessed with a variety of natural resources that could serve the course of intrapreneurship in the areas of crude oil, gas, and solid minerals in commercial quantities. Lemo, however, believes that even though, the current climate for employment and entrepreneurship in Nigeria may not be ideal, he is optimistic that the country would get over it, just like China did through an uncommon transformation that was made possible in the Asian country, which has assumed the current status of a global manufacturing power house and a net lender of capital to the global economy. And the way forward? The former CBN Deputy Governor concludes by charging all stakeholders to endeavour to rise up to the challenge by making the university system to undertake a comprehensive review of its curricular with a view to meeting the developmental aspirations of Nigeria.

Furthermore, there is need to re-order priorities and dedicate more resources to research and development to generate ideas and innovations, as universities partner the industry to generate the required funding for teaching and research. In the final analysis, beyond Lemo’s nuggets on how youths can be gainfully employed, it is important to equally look at the debilitating factors that continue to inhibit the development of Nigeria, which the countries cited by Lemo, such as US and China have been able to tackle to a large extent. These include the menace of corruption, nepotism, tribalism, god-fatherism, and religious bigotry that have become a recurring decimal, to truly engender entrepreneurship, intrapreneurship and youth employment in Nigeria.