By Chris Uwaje

Where is and how can we unearth the hidden paradise in Nigeria Youth? Perhaps the Nigeria Youth is grossly misunderstood? What went wrong? Are they really lazy? Definitely not.

The broken dreams of the Naija Youth today translate into: perpetually cueing for Visas to anywhere far away from home at all costs; enslaved to street trading for life? Having water and food everywhere but none to drink nor eat; Crossing the ferocious Sahara desert accompanied by death as only hope; Captured and auctioned and sold as 21^st Century slaves in Libya; Crossing the Mediterranean sea of death to Europe without a life-jacket; Abandoned by JAMB after many result-less attempts; Arrested and forever awaiting trial for wandering by day and night for inability to trade-in with 20 Naira by the men in Black – flicking funny torchlight in their faces and  finally thrown to the Shark in the nation’s deepest ocean of corruption to be mercilessly devoid addicted by drugs in search of Yahoo-Yahoo! There is an urgent need to engage on a national project on recovery of the troubled mind-set of millions of Nigerian Youth who are predominantly hooked on the Internet Cybercrime as gateway to wealth through fraudulent means.

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. Almost all painful feelings have their source in an incorrect way of looking at reality. When you uproot erroneous views, suffering ceases.” John Milton, Paradise Lost. Are we loosing the hidden paradise in our youth? This write-up is initiated after purposeful analytics by concerned interest group – undertaking a surgical analysis of the subject-matter. It is an urgent call to embark on a national psycho-sociological project to re-engineer and save the eroding mind-set of many of our Youth who are currently addicted to Internet scrams as the only way to progress and indeed their last hope in life, in the face of the blatant neglect and abandonment of the fundamental responsibility of leadership for sustainable youth development, And by extension, the survivability of our collective future. Our position is that the core of the problem under discussion resides in human attitude and crass neglect of critical child-case by leadership.

Relevant studies have shown how unrestrained youth-centered negative thinking form chronic attitudes which cumulatively derail and destroy concepts of nation-building, patriotism and sustainable development – especially when psychological and sociological development dimensions are neglected overtime. Is this the case with the branded “Yahoo-Yahoo Boys” of Nigeria? How long has this been going on and how long will it take to recover and heal this mountainous army of our derailed youthful minds which are critical for national development? What will become of the children and grand-children of the Yahoo-Yahoo Boys and it’s cultish impact on the future of our nation? Are our current Youth development programmes responsive and strategic enough to attain the desired goals?

Conventional wisdom informs that attitude is everything. However, attitude in its structural dynamics consists of the acquired state of mind, consisting primarily of environmental state and space-of-things, feelings, love, thoughts and propensity to codify appropriate responses towards to challenges we are confronted with. Indeed, our responses are mostly dictated by our conditioned mindset.

This conditioned mind-set ultimately drives us to attain either a positive or negative character in our relation with other objects and special set of things we come across.

Therefore as we forge along, it is instructive that we explore the attitudinal value-chain and conditions-of-things within the Nigeria development environment – particularly our leadership, family values, inconsistent policy-construct, education, merit assessment, child care and fundamental human rights and above all youth development programmes within the context of globalization.

Great minds such as Professor Emeritus Wole Soyinka had many decades ago observed and warned us on the emerging decay of values in leadership, economy and development with great impact on the Youth, when he advanced the hypothesis of the ‘wasted generation’ of Nigeria. Also, Prof. Patrick Okedinachi Utomi  – founder of Centre for Values and leadership had delivered the same warning topped up with a proof-of-concept – validated through CVL.Programme/Projects.

These critical warnings were taken for granted and not heeded by the leadership who failed to advance proactive strategies and programmes for sustainable Youth development while the population growth surged dramatically in the last fifty (50) years after the civil war. This abandoned responsibility cumulated into the breakdown of the value-chains for equitable nation building and fuelled corruption-of-things like a wide fire in the Harmattan.

Globalization is often misunderstood, when we fail to translate it as another word for the internationalization of interests, trade and commerce in pursuit of sustainable development – guided by specific standards. However, empowered by the audacity of the Internet (ICT) as the new tool of life, the norms and values of the Internet have been grossly misinterpreted at the most basic levels.

The Internet is here to stay and its mission and activities will be further tested and intensified by the demands for globalization-of-things and the critical adventure of each nation perching to controlling the human mind by harnessing life-activity data at all levels. That after all, is the purpose of Big-data, related algorithm and analytics!

For many decades, the Nigeria nation state has been dishing out mind-blowing figures of stolen money and wealth from our collective national resources and continues to display such outlandish data in the face of the swarming Youths who are angry and hungry for food, knowledge and visionary adventure but experience the mirage-of-things at almost all development stage. Does that not constitute a significant part of the formation of the mind-set of our Youth?

Nigeria’s e-readiness index status is abysmal low (119 out of 134 in 2016) in terms of enabling Networked environment and national IT spend, while the Youth population growth continues to surge with alarming stampede for access to everything for survival – throwing ethics and values to the dogs.

Currently, the age of top leadership base of many nations of the world are getting younger between 30-50 while Nigeria’s is ballooning from 70-80 years – further disillusioning the youth and their dreams.

With limited and/or non-existent enabling environment, fragile infrastructure, abandoned classrooms, zero Knowledge Park, the goal-post for trustworthiness and competitiveness continues to shift by the nano-second and the centre can no more hold.

The resultant effect is that we cultivate, operate and live in a non-creative Ecosystem devoid of innovation and best described as Okada economy.

Pathetically, as the tape of the nation’s Youth apathy film continues to roll, politicized by blatant policies which remain blinded by capital and employment flight, conspicuous consumption with preference to third-class foreign goods, glorified squandermenia culture and insatiable consumption mentality – a product of who you know instead of what you know!

All said, the activities of Yahoo-Yahoo Boys are nothing to be glorified. The YY syndrome is and should be seen as national scourge and the Youth Community must be called to order to dialogue and recover the hidden paradise of our youth. In other words the Youth of Nigeria must have a rethink about life and re-code their destiny.

To achieve this, they must also be ready to pay a price for sustainable success and happiness – knowing that they can do a million times better that YY.

The price is retooling the mind-set, consistency, endurance, humility, audacity of hope and rekindling the can-do positive attitude of the real Naija Pikin and ultimately shames the devil.

The long-term damage to Society is monumental, The Recovery Roadmap and Mechanism incorporates psychological and sociological healing incorporating: the critical application of the essential pillars for productive Youth Development: Policies, Strategies Legislations, Institutional Framework, Regulations and Fiscal Incentives on Child care, Education, Recreation, Entertainment and many more.

We are a nation of about 200million. So, what indeed does the Youth want form Nigeria. Tell me now now now!  Kilo sele gangan???