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Tag: seekers

  • New Year: Fun seekers flock Whispering Palms

    The Whispering Palms at Iworo in Badagry, Lagos State, yesterday recorded a large turnout of fun seekers who came to celebrate the New Year.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Nigerians from Lagos and some other states of the federation visit the resort to have a good time

    Mr Ayobami Badejo, who came to the resort with his family, said he took advantage of the holiday to spend time with his family there.

    “I have heard so much about this place; so, I decided to use this public holiday to come here to have fun with my family and I must confess, I am having a great time.

    “The environment is so good and there are so many activities to do here; like you can see, my kids are using the swing and after that, we would go to the pool.

    “It is really fun here and I would definitely come back here when I am chanced,” Badejo said.

    Mr Ademola Akano, who came with his girlfriend, could not hide his excitement.

    “This place is so lovely, I didn’t even know that there is a mini zoo here and the animals are so friendly and clean.

    “The view of the seaside is a joy to behold, the environment is so friendly. This place is so wonderful.

    “I am going to tell my friends about this place so that they too can enjoy what I have enjoyed,” Akano said.

    Mr Olumide Olaomoju, who came from Ilorin, the Kwara State capital, said he didn’t regret his trip.

    “I am going to be here for the rest of the week and I am glad I chose this place for my vacation.

    “Everything I want and need is here and the environment is fantastic,” Olaomoju said.

    Mr Deji Femi-Pearse, the owner of the resort, attributed the large turnout to the constant rebranding of the resort.

    “Every time, we keep on bringing in new things to keep on attracting people here because we don’t want them to keep seeing the same thing over and over again.

    “We hope that in a few months, we would be able to bring some dolphins and we are already creating an environment for them.”

    He appealed to the government to improve power supply in the area.

    “We spend millions on running our generators because we have no power supply here and this is not good for business,” Femi-Pearse said.

  • Age discrimination and job seekers

    SIR: Discrimination  like  a  cancerous  cell  grows  when  tolerated,  stunts  development  and  decelerates  productivity. In  every  facet  of  our  national history,  we  seem  to  be making  progress  at  a  snail  crawling  speed  when compared  with  nations  who  became  independent  same  time  with  us.

    Unemployment  rate  in  Nigeria  increased  to  10.40  percent  in  the  fourth  quarter  of  2015, which  is  roughly  eight million Nigerians. It  is  in  Nigeria  that  students  attend  universities  for  a  four -year  course  and  end  up  spending  seven  years as  a  result  of  numerous  strikes  by varsity  lecturers  and  forced  recesses  occasioned  by  unrest.

    It  is  in  Nigeria  that  graduates  would  search  frantically  for  five,  seven  and  even  nine  years  for  jobs  without success. Bearing  this  in  mind,  it  is  so  unkind  for  employers  to  put  more  pressure  and  pauperize  he  already traumatized  job  seeker  as  a  result  of  age  discrimination.

    In  civilized  nations,  many  labour  laws  have  been  enacted  against  age  discrimination  in employment matters. For  example  in  1967,  under  the  U.S   Age discrimination  in  employment  Act,  it  is  unlawful  to  fail  to  hire or  sack  someone  on  the  grounds  of  age  if  the  employee  is  over  40. Also  the  U.K  Age  Discrimination  in  employment  Act  of  2006  makes  it  unlawful  to  deny  any  age  group employment  as  long  as  one is  within  the  legal  working  age.

    The  advanced  countries  with  anti-age  discrimination  laws  have  made  enviable  strides  in  social  justice  by creating  a  level  playing  field  for  all  their  capable  citizenry  at  the  workplace.

    A  negative  effect  of  this  age  discrimination  by  employers  of  labour  is  that  it  makes  many  Nigerians  to declare  false  ages  to  be  eligible  for  employment. In  many  countries  of  the  world,  employment  practices  are  based  on  skills  and  competence  rather  than age,  but  in  Nigeria,  employers  especially  the  government,  who  should  lead  by  not  throwing  away competent  hands,  deny  employment  to  its  citizenry.

    Most  banks,  through  various  Human  Resources  Organizations  deny  many  Nigerians  contract  employment  if you  are  above  24  years  or  26  years  if  lucky. If  this  government  that  got  huge  votes  from  the  teeming  unemployed  youths,  now  deny  same  by  tagging its  vacancy  in  the  EFCC  recruitment at  27  years,  thereby  shutting  out  the  skillful and competent  hands  from  serving  their  fatherland, it  is  disheartening  and  unpatriotic.

    We  are  in  the  21st  century;  the  federal  legislators  should  be  deliberating  about  laws  that engender  unity, foster  rapid  development,  bring  about  attitudinal  change  and  not  the  comical  relief  they  are  reeling  with Saraki  today,  budget  controversy  tomorrow.

    The  President  should  do  the  needful  by  issuing  a  Presidential  directive  against  age  discrimination  towards job -seekers  so  as  not  to  shut  out  talented,  passionate  and  patriotic  citizens. It  was  on  the  basis  of  competence  and  passion that our  beloved  President  was  elected  as  against  those  that termed  him  too  old  and  incompetent.

     

    • Rosemary Kevwe,

    Lagos.

  • Enlarging youths’, entrepreneurs’, job seekers’ coast

    Enlarging youths’, entrepreneurs’, job seekers’ coast

    For the over 4,000 prospective entrepreneurs and career seekers, who attended the Sterling Bank’s Get Ready for Work initiative, in Lagos, the chances of either starting new businesses or securing choice jobs look promising. The event was an opportunity for the lender to deepen its retail banking segment among youths, support those seeking capital and knowledge and those who want to start new businesses, reports COLLINS NWEZE.

    Entrepreneurship is the soul of every thriving economy and so is a productive workforce.

    Sterling Bank’s Get Ready for Work initiative held in Lagos at the weekend broadened the opportunity for young entrepreneurs and job seekers to achieve their life ambitions.

    The event, with the theme “Mind The Gap” was organised to help participants understand what they need to make it in life, whether in businesses or paid employment.

    The event, part of the bank’s Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives, was supported by online job portal, Jobberman and skills development centre, Field of Skills and Dream. It empowered over 4,000 graduates with employable and entrepreneurship skills.

    The event presented a platform for the bank to bridge the financial exclusion gap as its staff also encouraged participants to open accounts with the bank and enjoy the benefits. For instance, as fallout of last year’s programme, the bank gave grants to those who have started their businesses. Four beneficiaries got N2.5 million, N1.5 million, N1 million and N500,000. The gesture is expected to be repeated this year.

    The bank has consistently reaffirmed its commitment to promoting retail banking which allows it to provide banking services to individual consumers. Such services include savings and transactional accounts, mortgages, personal loans, debit cards, and credit cards, among others.

    This year’s events also witnessed a psychoanalysis session where the participants had their personalities analysed by an expert to determine what career path would be most suitable for them. It also featured speeches from successful career people on how to tread successfully on whatever career path one may choose.

    Chief Executive Officer, Wakanow, Obinna Okezie, urged the participants to be hard working. He said: “We started with nothing, but today, we employ over 500 people in our five years of operation. That is why it is important for you all to pursue your ideas and turn them to reality.’’

    Executive Director, Field of Skills and Dreams VTE Academy (FSD)  Omowale Ogunrinde,   commended Sterling Bank for investing in the future of youths in country through the initiative.

    According to her, the bank was responsible for organisations like hers agreeing to take part in the programme without charging participants professional fees. She said her firm is doing everything possible to get more Nigerians prepared to become better entrepreneurs. He said the FSD has in recent years, equipped the youths with entrepreneurial skills that enabled them to start their own businesses. “We are helping to build enduring entrepreneurs. This can only be achieved through training and commitment from organisations as Sterling Bank is doing,” she said.

    Sterling Bank’s Executive Director, Finance & Strategy, Abubakar Suleiman, said apart from getting the youth ready to pursue their career choices and helping them acquire the required skills, the lender will also through the programme, reduce the unemployment rate in the country.

    Suleiman, who spoke at the pre-event briefing held in Lagos, said: ‘Get Ready For Work’, now in its third year, is the bank’s way of giving back to the society and equipping the youths with the right skills to succeed in their jobs.

    He also said the lender is considering extending its “Get Ready For Work”initiative to more states of the Federation and encouraged other banks to join in the project.

    He said the lender was committed to helping to reduce the high level of youth unemployment in the country, pointing out that there would be serious consequences for the society if the problem is not addressed.

    According to him: “There is no country in the world that would not be affected by a high level of youth unemployment. Once youth employment stands above 25 per cent in any country, such country is heading for chaos.”

    He noted that the problem of youth unemployment in the country had been  made worse by the fact that what students are taught in schools these days often leaves them ill-equipped to handle simple tasks when they eventually secure employment.

    Speaking to reporters during the training, Sterling Bank’s Head of Strategy and Communications, Shina Atilola, said the initiative was part of the bank’s efforts at addressing the paucity of skills in the labour market.

    He said: “We discovered that when you analyse the Nigerian labour market there is disconnect between the demand and supply. Most of the jobs that are available, most people are not qualified for them. But this is because our institutions are not prepared to take them into the employment system. We also initiated this programme because we realised that some people are qualified but are not employable. This is because, there is no institutional structure to train them and prepare them for a work environment.

    “These are the reasons Sterling Bank started this ‘Get ready for work’ initiative. We have brought successful entrepreneurs to come mentor these young people. Beyond that, some people that are just willing to work in career employment, we have also brought in people that have made impact and are successful in their careers to come and teach them how they succeeded in it. We also have brought in human resources agencies to teach them how to best market themselves.”

    He also said this seminar had over 3,000 people registered, saying that over 4,000 were present. This, according to him was a clear indication that there are a lot of willing applicants with no jobs. Also he added that some applicants would be divided into master classes with seasoned Entrepreneurs, high flying career individuals.

    Life coach/psychoanalyst, Jerome Onipede engaged entrepreneurs in a master class on what it takes to develop a business and make it in the cut-throat environment like Nigeria. Another class was also organised for career focused individuals to learn how to become employees of value in any organisation of their choice. The event gave participants the opportunity to interact with human resource representatives of various organisations and undergo on-the-spot testing with a view of securing jobs.

    Olise-Emeka Nwachukwu, Consultant at Human Capacity Development Consultants, said Sterling Bank is trying to bridge the gap between competencies in terms of employment and entrepreneurship in the market.

    “We have a large number of young people who leave school, and need to take step one to become skilled, in terms of ready to work environment.

    They also need to know how to set up their business. People do not have the right attitude to work, they do not have the right skills to take the available jobs. The schools only give them theory about the knowledge of the job.

    It is about people understanding the competencies that are required to be good performers. “What Sterling Bank has done is to bring these young people together and get experts in different fields to talk to them. And they also give them the opportunity to drop their resume with human resources firms that are here,” he said.

    He said his firm helps orgnaisations to develop their staff to optimum levels. “All the collected resumes will be uploaded to our database, and we will match them with employers. Getting a job is a prerogative of the staff. There are few experienced people also, and we are looking at ways to support them. I am looking at theirs skills and experiences, which help us profile the candidates and match them with available roles,” he said.

    Nwachukwu said the company also looks at candidates achievements over time, because that could explain that if you have been doing this, there will be possibility that you will do well.

    Continuing, he said that it is not everyone that really needs to get a job as a good number are better off with entrepreneurship. “People have to understand that it is not just about getting a job but people can go into entrepreneurship, focusing on everyday needs of the people and they will make their money because people spend so much money on their everyday needs. Young people need to understand their skills, develop them and transform them into money making ventures rather than just looking for job,” he said.

    He said the company’s Productivity Plus, looks at people’s lives and train them on how to become successful. “We set your financial goals, academic goals, careers goals and emotional goals and put a system that will help you to achieve those goals. Some of the candidates have been contacted, and will be given direction on the next phase of their lives,” he said.

    A Human Resources Officer, H. Pierson, Tom Onoja, said his team had been able to interview 10 candidates, who would progress to the next phase of their career.

    “We are helping people that are looking for job find the right employers. We already have 10 people we are trying to get job for in line with our goal of assisting the bank to achieve their goals. We will keep talking to all the people that are qualified, and they will all be contacted,” he said.

    A participant, Godwin Nwachukwu, who graduated from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka said his expectations were met at the event. He said his details are already with the human resource mangers from the event, who he believed will contact him later on. “I am confident that I will be contacted. And besides, what I have learnt is enough to enable be start my own business,” he said.

    Managing Partner, Red Media Africa, Chude Jideonwo, said: “We would share skills and knowledge that can help them as they get into the work space because there are so many young unemployed people.”

     

    Partnership with FSD

    Sterling Bank Plc has signed an agreement with Field of Skills and Dreams (FSD), a vocational training institution, to provide training programmes for members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC).

    The pact, the bank said, is part of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) drive to support skill acquisition among youths to prepare them for self-employment.

    Under the agreement, the bank will sponsor the training of NYSC corps members in various vocations during the course of their service year in alignment with its expressed purpose of enriching lives. The lender has so far funded the training of about 100 NYSC members in various vocations during the pilot stage through the NYSC-SAED (Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development.

  • ‘Why job seekers hardly find jobs’

    ‘Why job seekers hardly find jobs’

    Abimbola Adewole is Chief Executive Officer, Prinaas Communications Limited, promoters of The Job Show, a flagship programme dedicated to job seekers, which runs on local and terrestrial television and radio. The Job Show, which has provided about 2,000 jobs for people in the past two years, has eight million Nigerians and 21million Africans following the programme internationally. In this interview with Daniel Adeleye and Omolewa Oshin, Adewole speaks on unemployment crisis and proffers solutions. Excerpts:

    How did you come about the idea of The Job Show?                                                                                                   

    I must quickly say that I cannot take The Job Show away from the recognition for my better half, Omotola Adewole. There was a night she told me that she needed to change her job. She was looking for a way to get a better job, she shared her thoughts with me and said I should get her a job. I looked and searched there was no way to talk to other school owners to get a change of job for her. That fateful night I woke up around 4:00 am in the morning, I went to my library and opened up my system and I extracted 69 phone numbers of school owners, and I extracted them to notepad and I also did  sms: ‘I said good morning my name is Omotola Adewole. I’m a graduate of Linguistics from the University of Lagos. I can teach English Language, Linguistics or Mathematics. In case you need my services, please kindly call on me.’ And I put her mobile number and I sent that information to 69 school owners.

    In the morning, quarter to seven or thereabouts, she got the first call, it was on a Saturday. That please, we saw your SMS. Can you please come over for a quick job chat? On Monday I took her there and she went upstairs to meet the owner of the school and about an hour and half later, she came down and said: ‘Bimbo you know what, I got a new job!

    Immediately she said that I got into action. I was thinking, okay, if this can work for my wife, then obviously, it should be able to work for job seekers. That is the genesis of how The Job Show started. And the moment we did that I put my documents together and I sent it to Cityfm. Cityfm called for a meeting and I attended that meeting, that meeting lasted for 18minutes before like minds accepted that truly we can create more job opportunities for Nigerians. I cannot be saying this without mentioning some fantastic guys in that meeting, like two years ago when I came for the meeting at Cityfm. Oscar Oyesom, Head of Programmes for Cityfm, Nnamdi Obanya was the Business Development Manager for Cityfm as at that time, then I had this fantastic Head of Marketing, Mr. Jumbo we had that meeting together, and these people took that idea and immediately it became something that we all smile about till date.

    As a human resource expert what’s your assessment of the job market generally in terms of skills gap, opportunities?                                                                                                                                                                                          

    In terms of skills gap and opportunities, I must say there’re two different things. There is a big vacuum and I must say we have not really gotten the solution right. The skills are there, but there are nobody to tap into those skills. Just like what I treated this morning with an HR adviser from Canada that I advised. She said we can afford to release millions of graduate every year out to the labour market but the moment we are disconnecting with skills acquisition and I tell you the millions of graduates that will still be coming out of the universities system will never get a job, the opportunities are endless. If you look everywhere, you find opportunities everywhere. The moment you walk into an office, walk into an average office in Lagos, Abuja or Port Harcourt, you can find a vacuum there of what you need to do. If you walk into a firm, you see a minimum of 10, 15 cars what comes to your mind is you can make money by just watching those cars every day. I tell you, Nigerian graduates are not thinking. We’re not there yet. My suggestions or solutions if I may say is get your degree, get a skill, work on your skill, develop on your skill and move with the trend.

    Do we have adequate data on the number of the unemployed? Are the available jobs commensurate with spaces?                                                

    Unfortunately, it’s so sad that as we speak, we don’t have accurate or decent data for job seekers, for employees for entrepreneurs and for employers of labour. I had a guest on my show Mr. Kola Olugbodi who is a background expert, trained abroad and he told me on the show that Bimbo, are you aware that we have over 62 million job seekers in this country? That is killing, that is unfriendly and unsuitable for an economy that wants to grow. And as a matter of fact, the moment you see 30% of your population being unemployed, you should run, you should have a think tank that can sit and quickly reduce that population to 10% or 15%. As far as I’m concerned, having 30% of the population of your country unemployed is a bombshell.

    You mention that graduates should develop their skills. But do you think the government has done enough in the area of capacity building?                                                                                                                      

    I stand to be corrected. But as far as I know, since I have been running this concept, I think what we have is disjointed flow of ideas, where you have various hundreds or thousands of agencies springing up without having a centralised data, not having a centralised focus point on how to tackle unemployment. What is the essence of having an agency like National Directorate of Employment (NDE) what is the essence of having SURE-P what is the essence of having them. Some agencies that the local government would come up with, state government will develop, federal level will also develop. We don’t have synergy in these agencies, and the moment you don’t have synergy in these agencies, what you have, you have duplications of process, ideas, innovation that will not work. I want to see a future like the foreign land where you have a centralised point where the local government will integrate with the state government, the state government will integrate with the federal government and they can truly say we have empowered people. I foresee that in 10 years or 15 years from now, we should be able to say we have addressed the problem of unemployment in the country.

    There is still a lot of emphasis on whitecollar jobs, considering the high ratio of applicants entering the labour market. What in your view should be the emphasis?                                                                                   

    There is no solution to unemployment. What can work is for us to have more entrepreneurs. The white-collar job is fantastic, it’s nice to dress up in the morning get your tie and move to an office and sit comfortably within the four walls of a corporate environment. But I tell you, it will not do you good. I always say on my show that every job is always a part-time. What that means is that there is no job you do as an employee that a time will come that you need to walk away from that job, and if you don’t walk away from the job, the job will definitely walk away from you. The white-collar job is not the solution, the solution for unemployment is to empower people’s mindset that entrepreneurship is the solution to joblessness. You must empower people. We must embrace full-fledged entrepreneurial process. Look at China for instance, look at Singapore and Malaysia.

    A Chinese man can walk into the Chinese Commission in China and decide to invest in Tanzania. There is a provision from the Chinese government to give a minimum of $100, 000 interest-free loans to a Chinese man that wants to invest in a particular economy. As a matter of fact, the interest is negative it is entering into negative and that is the solution. That is the way to go if we need to kill unemployment to a reasonable level in Nigeria.

    Labour still remains poorly priced here if you consider the fact that some fresh graduates earn as low as N50, 000 per month, especially in banks, manufacturing, etc. How can this be addressed?                                         

    First you have to consider what is the minimum wage for this country? It is N18, 000. So if we have N50, 000 paid to graduates, that’s fantastic. But my point is the Federal Government will need to have a re-assessment of the minimum wage, for God’s sake how do you give N50,000 to a graduate, who spent four-five, seven years in a university environment, served his fatherland for a year and you take home N50, 000. I’m not going to say the employers are faulty because it is what you have that you can give, it is what the economy can give you that you can also give out to your employees.                                                                                                I would rather prefer it to be a foundational amendment, let the federal government amend the minimum wage and let the normal suitable working environment be put in place for employers. For God’s sake, how can you operate without a steady power supply? How do you operate that you need to make 10 calls to 10 clients and you are recharging your phone for N5, 000. Have been opportune to travel to South Africa, I know how much I loaded my phones, I know how long I was on the phone talking to people internationally. How can you make calls N1000 and you exhaust your N1000 recharge cards on just one conversation, for God’s sake where is the entrepreneurial easy platform for survival? Unfortunately, this is not available here. I would rather want a foundational amendment that minimum wage should be amended, policies should suit employers of labour, economic facilities should be put in place so that every employer, every manufacturer can have a good playing ground to work with.

    Through your medium you have been able to provide jobs for over 2,000 people. How did you achieve this feat and what next?                                                                                                                               

    You know it’s funny when people see me and call me the job man or the man that gives jobs. Some even say the man that is a comedian that does not take money from job seekers. This is my point, because I have been privileged to have a platform like this and people have shared their testimonies on how they got a job. I think we have done more than 2,000, but the one I can lay my hands on is 1,997 people that have been gainfully employed on this platform. We help people secure jobs in banks, manufacturing firms, media firms, aviation, etc. The most interesting part of this process is that I’m not a magician, I don’t manufacture jobs, what I have is what is creating those jobs. I have a platform where employers can release job vacancies, the job seekers can listen and I can connect that information to job seekers, that is my job and that has brought us to this level.

    Information makes a man succeed, the people that are successful and the people that are not successful have you asked yourself why a graduate of Economics and another graduate of Economics will graduate same time out of the universities and one will decide to live in Lagos and the other decides to live in the village, and 10 years later you see them again the man that lives in Lagos is coping up with the economy he is doing well, and the one that decided to go back to the village has not done well.

    The missing link to me is information, the man in Lagos has been able to connect to where the information is and applied, but the man in the village will read papers that have already been read in Lagos, people have already applied for those jobs before that information got to him in the village. So it is information vacuum that I’m filling and that is where it sounds to people like I have got the magic wand to create jobs. I don’t have a magic wand and I’m not a magician. The Job Show is an information platform where job seekers and employers connect together.

  • Do they know it’s Christmas?

    It is a yearly event that Christendom looks forward to not because it is a time to wine and dine; but  because of the significance of the Messiah’s  birth. Over 2000 years ago in the city of Bethlehem, Jesus was born in a manger. Yet, from that humble background, He rose to world acclaim. This is why His birthday is celebrated worldwide every year in remembrance of the life He lived in order to save mankind.

    Jesus lived and died for man to be saved. He did not come to the world for the righteous, according to the scripture. He came for sinners. This is why in His lifetime, He neither condemned nor judged people. He simply led all to the right path. At Christmas, the world remembers His coming with nostalgia because He came so that we may have life more abundant. He was an only begotten child who was sacrificed for the good of man.

    Man is expected to be Christlike, to live holy and see ourselves as our brother’s keeper. These are traits we are expected to exhibit every day, but more often than not, we do not. We live for ourselves not bothering about the other fellow. At Christmas, things change; we become kind and of good nature. We see the other man as our neighbour whose needs must be met whether or not he asks for our help.

    If only we could do half of the good we display at Christmas, our country will be a better place to live. It is at Christmas that we remember that our neighbour is hungry; it is at Christmas that we remember that  our neighbour’s children cannot go to school because of lack of financial wherewithal; it is at Christmas that we remember to be of good behaviour. Just because it is Christmas, we believe that we should act as saint and not be seen perpetrating evil. Oh. how I wished everyday is Christmas.

    Despite our penchant to do good during this season, there are some who are still not touched by this outpouring of love. We do not remember such people because they are far from our thoughts. It is not that we are not aware of their existence. We are aware of them, but we do not remember them. These are the people who have been lying in hospitals for years nursing injuries from which they may never recover except by divine intervention. I am talking, among others,  of the paraplegic who can neither move nor do anything for themselves.

    Many of them are in orthopaedic hospitals, lying down in one place because of their inability to use their limbs. We tend to forget these people at this season because it does not cross our minds to go look for them. We are only concerned with the needs of those in our immediate environment and do not cast our nets wide for the sick and elderly, who have been  abandoned in Old People’s Homes. The joy of Christmas should radiate in every corner of the universe and in every home, hospital and rehabilitation centre.

    Painfully in the homes of the missing Chibok girls this Christmas, this joy will be missing. It is not that these households do not want to celebrate, but circumstances beyond their control have robbed them of such celebration. In the rustic Chibok community in Borno State, over 200 families will not know the joy of the season. As I was pounding away on my desktop on Tuesday, something made me look up at the television and what i read on the screen pierced my heart.

    The Cable News Network (CNN) was running a promo of its interview with some of the missing Chibok girls’ parents. The girls were kidnapped from their school last April 15 and since then they have remained in captivity. For eight months, their parents have not heard from the girls  nor do they know where these  children are being kept. When the girls were snatched in April the world rose in condemnation of their abduction.

    The United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK), among other powerful countries,  promised to assist Nigeria in getting back the girls. Nobody knows how far they have gone in making good their promises. Are they still interested in helping us get the girls? Is there any hope of getting all the girls back intact? How committed is the Federal Government to the rescue of the girls? It is sad that these girls will be spending their first Christmas away from home in captivity.

    I watched dejected  as two parents – a man and a woman – spoke of the trauma of a Christmas without their children. The man said : ”Every Christmas, we come together as a family and we are happy. How can we be happy now, when one of us is not here?”  The woman said : ”There is nothing I can say, it has happened. It is a bad Christmas”. If those in power were to be in these parents’ shoes, I am sure they would have spoken in like manner.

    How can any parent, no matter how heartless he or she may be, celebrate Christmas knowing that his or her daughter is in kidnappers’ den. The most heartrending of it all is that we do not even know if the girls are still with their abductors, sold into slavery or married off. For as long as these girls remain in captivity so long will their parents be pining away in anguish and sorrow, thinking of what would have been if their daughters were with them.

    These parents can no longer know the joy of Christmas. Their  homes were  once  bubbling at a season like this, with laughter ringing out from children, friends and relations. Painfully, this season, the reverse will be the case and it may be so for a long time, with the way the government is going about the rescue of the girls. How do you wish parents like this, Merry Christmas. That’s a tough call.

    Favour seekers

    The Quran and Bible enjoin us to be cheerful givers.  These  holy books also tell us that whatever good we do with our right hand should not be known to the left. Many people, however, find it difficult to live up to these injunctions. Some give to show off or to curry the favour of those in power. For others, their giving is pay back time for favour once done them. They do not give to attract the blessing of God, they give for political and other reasons. Last Saturday, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) held a fund raising for its presidential candidate, Dr Goodluck Jonathan and some individuals and institutions virtually broke the bank in order to be seen donating towards ”a worthy cause”.  In a society where many are dying of hunger; where there are no good roads; where the hospitals are ”mere consulting clinics”; where power is unstable, N21.7billion was raised within the twinkling of an eye. The donors did not give because they love the president, they gave in order to be in his good book and to be the first to be considered for those juicy contracts when the  time comes. You do not give a sitting president a billion naira or more for nothing; you are saving towards the rainy day when your donation will speak for you. Is that a cheerful giver? No, that is a favour seeker.

  • ‘Fake’ NSCDC officer allegedly dupes 54 job seekers of N8.5m

    The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) has arrested a man, Wasiu Adewale Azees, for allegedly parading himself as the Chief Superintendent Officer of the corps in Offa, Kwara State.

    Azees has allegedly made N8.5 million from 54 job seekers.

    But the suspect, who claimed to be a former volunteer in the corps, did not deny the allegation but told reporters yesterday that he had been working with some NSCDC senior officers at the national headquarters and Lagos to defraud job seekers.

    Parading the suspect in Abuja, the Corps Public Relations Officer (PRO), Mr. Emmanuel Okeh, said Azees was caught following a report and various complaints against “an NSCDC man” who had been collecting money from people in the name of recruitment.

    Okeh said: “Unfortunately, Wasiu Adewale Azees, from Offa, Kwara State, in his own capacity, decided to brand himself a Chief Superintendent, a senior officer of the corps. He decided to open his own parallel organisation, thereby recruiting job seekers illegally and giving them fake appointment letters upon the payment of the amounts he demanded.”

    The NSCDC spokesman explained that the suspect was not only parading himself as a senior officer of the corps in Kwara State, but was also “going about to impersonate in the name of Civil Defence, attending functions in the uniform of Civil Defence, taking photographs with senior officers of different services, such as the Nigeria Army, Immigration, Police and Navy. So, it was these photographs he showed his victims as a senior officer of the NSCDC.”