Tapping Youth Potential for Enterprise Revolution – a Niger Delta Perspective

and not just in the oil sector or in the Delta. The larger repercussion of the Delta crisis has been on Abuja’s efforts to achieve rapid and sustainable development through enterprise revolution. Clearly, that effort faces its biggest challenge in the escalating petro-violence.

Past initiatives in this regard, like the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), could only accomplish limited success in the areas of youth development and conflict resolution, largely due to bureaucratic inefficiency, inconsistent policies and the absence of regulatory frameworks. Because of its complex geopolitical and economic history, youth empowerment in Nigeria demands a holistic approach focussed on certain key issues:

* Overhaul of the education system with specific emphasis on skills development and vocational training.
* Provision of meaningful employment and occupational avenues that are consistent with local realities.
* Administrative reforms that focus on transparency and accountability in youth policy implementation.
* Rehabilitation programmes that successfully wean away militants from violence and into economically productive endeavours.
* Instilling attitudes of national pride among the youth through creatively designed outreach programmes.
* Promoting extensive youth entrepreneurship by means of financial concessions, technical assistance and grants-in-aid.
* Safety-net social policies that persuade the coming generation of Nigerian youth away from crime and violence.
* In the contest of Nigeria’s troubled past, maintaining political stability and authority of democratic institutions are critical to the success of any worthwhile youth revival initiative
* Effective poverty alleviation programmes that focus on enterprise development as a viable means to legitimate prosperity. Mobilization of the youth workforce to promote rapid entrepreneurial development in rural and urban areas alike.
* Improvement in per capita income, standard of living and related human development indices through implementation of informed social and economic policy changes

Much as entrepreneurial development is central to the theme of national revival, so is peace in the Niger Delta region. President Yaradua’s amnesty offer in fact expressly cites that many Niger Delta militants are “able-bodied youths whose energies could be harnessed for the development of the nation at large.” To develop a nation of entrepreneurs, there must be a multi-sectoral, multi-level and multi-phase undertaking that begins with a collective resolve to get out of the old mould of doing things. We need passionate promoters of the entrepreneurial spirit that can inspire an entrepreneurial revolution in Nigeria and even Africa in totality. Hence, a radical and coordinated attempt to accelerate wealth creation through the promotion of innovative business practices. This acknowledgement is a standing testament of the fact that Nigeria’s long-term goals are unachievable without the whole-hearted participation of its sizeable youth population, even those who insist on holding on to their guns for now!

(For the entire clip, visit antishostile at www.youtube.com/antihostile.) In this clip, Malcolm X explains how the Black Muslims under the leadership of Elijah Muhammad have healed many of the wounds of the black community, including lying, cheating, stealing, drug-abuse, and violence.
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