OPEN LETTER TO THE PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF THE ARMED FORCES DR GOODL

Commercialisation of Job Applications

CC:

The Honourable Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu

The Honourable President of the Senate, Senator (Dr) David A.B. Mark, GCON, FNIM

The Honourable Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon Dimeji Bankole

The Honourable Minister of Justice, Justice Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN

Your Excellency,

As many Nigerians watch with consternation the growing level of unemployment in our country, endowed with numerous natural resources, many have failed to spot the new dimension being introduced into the unemployment market.

Quite a number of government ministries, parastatals, and agencies have recently designed and started testing a daring formula to extract money from the desperate unemployed in the country. The recent introduction of application fees in the form of scratch cards, bank draft etc in some of the advertised jobs in the country calls for the urgent attention of well meaning Nigerians. This limiting condition introduced into the recruitment exercises has prevented a lot of qualified unemployed youths from getting employed, as they are expected to pay the required application fees before they can access application forms for roles being advertised by intending employers. Considering the current level of economic hardship in the country, many have failed to raise such application fees on time to make these applications.

This situation is not only being construed as an exploitative measure, if not an outright fraud, but is also perceived to be worsening the hardship among the unemployed youths. The realisation that government agencies, ministries, and some state governments are the ones championing this recent scam is heart-rending. Your Excellency, you would agree with us that it is callous and a misnomer to mandate someone (directly/indirectly) to purchase application form for a job he/she is not even sure of securing? This goes contrary to the expectation of the people of a government elected to cater for the wellbeing of its citizens. We urge you to use your good office to put an immediate stop to these negative tendencies that have continuously been used to emasculate and exploit the vulnerability of the masses.

Current statistics show that more than 50 percent of graduates in the country remain unemployed (Daily Champion, 13 April 2010) and there has not been any tangible government effort to support and cater for the wellbeing of these unemployed youths. It is disheartening that while other governments all over the world make life easier for its unemployed through the provision of unemployment benefits, creation of job centres with free telephone and Internet facilities to support applicants during job hunting and application process, ours view the conception of this dubious scheme to exploit her vulnerable applicants, as a new form of revenue generation. This ugly situation has forced many young talents to embark on criminal and hazardous adventures they would not have ventured into, under normal circumstances, which have resulted in dangerous implications for them and the nation in general. One would expect the government to introduce measures to cushion the effects of the soaring unemployment rate among the youths, as majority of them have been compelled to rely on parents and relatives who are equally struggling to make ends meet. This situation has also forced some unscrupulous parents and relatives into corrupt practices in their places of work in order to support their unemployed youths. More over, it would not require an extensive study for one to realise that the current spate of violence and level of insecurity in the country is a direct consequence of this high level of unemployment.

One wonders what kind of principles some of the government agencies or ministries have that make them liaise with banks and IT companies to extract money from the unemployed youths (under the guise of offering them employment opportunities), who ought to have been placed on unemployment benefits, as practiced in other countries of the world. It breaks the heart more as one tries to find the justification for such callous actions. A case at hand is the recent advert from the Imo State government promising 10,000 employment opportunities to graduates. The would-be applicants were expected to pay N2000, in order to obtain the application form. Some other instances are the adverts placed by the Nigerian Army and Navy for a direct short service recruitment program, in which candidates were compelled to purchase scratch cards at the price of N2000 and N1000 respectively, from Oceanic bank and UBA branches nationwide to enable them access the Nigerian Army and Navy online registration / application process (Tuesday Guardian of 14 November 2009). We view this as outright fraud. Why should a state government demand such amount from people it wishes to help? Doesn’t the government realise that most of those youths, by virtue of the fact that they are unemployed and without any other means of livelihood cannot afford such amount of money, particularly when every other prospective employer seems to be heading in the same direction of extorting fees from the helpless unemployed? Or is the government expecting them to get the money from retired parents, who hardly receive their pensions, or relatives that are being owed salaries and allowances? We are expecting the Imo State government to tell Nigerians the number of youths it eventually employed.

This exposes either how ignorant some of our rulers are of the hardship facing the majority of people in the country or their insensitivities to the perilous conditions they have plunged the masses into. Assuming that the youths could afford the amount of money required to make one of such applications, do they (employers) realise the number of applications these unemployed graduates make in a month? If all the potential employers continue to adopt this pay-before-applying-strategy, do they realise that an applicant may have to spend about N50, 000 naira on the average per month, to make 25 of such non-guaranteed job applications? Where do they expect such money to come from? We think that this is just another way of discouraging unemployed youths from making applications. If the government ministries and agencies are eager to generate revenue, there are other viable ways of doing this than exploiting the same people they are meant to help. We do recognise the fact that Nigeria being a member of the International Labour Organisation respects the provisions of ILO Conventions, and there are provisions under the current Labour Act of the country, for fee-charging employment agencies, but it has to be put into consideration that in other ILO member countries, the unemployed are adequately provided for financially to cater for situations when they may recourse to the services of fee-charging employment agencies.

The harrowing experience most Nigerian youths are being forced to go through can hardly be overstated. The rigorous process of making online applications via snail-speed Internet networks to the stressful and mostly non-productive series of aptitude tests, where thousands are invited to slug it out for few available positions (it still baffles one, why the employing organisations are too inefficient to do a proper screening of applications, in order to scale down the number of candidates invited for tests) is already a nightmare that will be compounded by this recent introduction of application fees. The life of an average graduate is a sad story of neglect, discouragement, hardship, and limitations to his potentials. And as one battles with the already existing problems in the rough terrain of the employment market, while trying to get a foothold into gainful employment, one’s life is being made more miserable by this inhumane caveat precluding one from applying for a job without paying for it!

As a result of this, we the members of the Petroleum Technology Development Fund Scholars (PTDF 2007 Scholars Forum) have resolved to push for a presidential caveat/directive or amendment of the existing Labour Act, to stop this developing hazard, as well as call for a reform in the entire recruitment exercise in the country. This is to combat the hardship and neglect that the average Nigerian youth is being made to face. We have analysed the implication of this recent situation and envisage its ugly implications for the future of the nation. No doubt, most private sector employers are still watching to see how the nation reacts to this new wave of exploitation. One can only imagine what would be the fate of the unemployed by the time every organisation advertising their jobs starts to exploit would-be applicants through the aforementioned means.

We therefore ask Your Excellency that you use your good office to initiate a reform of the present Labour Act or to use a Presidential Caveat to tackle this issue and other issues that have negatively affected employment process in the country. We expect the following suggestions to be taken into consideration in the process:

i. All forms of fees/charges, which applicants/job seekers are made to pay in pursuant of job applications (application fees, result status checking fees etc) should be prohibited/abolished. Any organisation found to be engaging in such should be fined/ adequately dealt with.

ii. All applicants shortlisted for interviews/aptitude tests must at least be reimbursed/compensated for most of the expenses incurred (especially transportation fare) for attending such interviews, by the interview organising body.

iii. The entire recruitment process, including the advertisement period and short-listing of successful candidates must not exceed a maximum of 6 calendar months.

iv. Interview feedbacks must be communicated to unsuccessful candidates by the interview organising body as soon as possible after the interview but not later than 28 days after the completion of the interview via email, or post.

v. List of successful candidates of any recruitment exercise must be made available to the public through at least three popular dailies in the country.

vi. On no account must any job advert discriminate against potential candidates on the account of age or gender. This particularly refers to the archaic 28-30 years age limit barrier included in most job adverts in the country. The must-be-experienced clause making waves in most job adverts MUST be removed from all employment adverts except in situations where there is ample evidence that such experience are required in that particular role. Companies or organisation must be prepared to train their employees – Every unemployed youth should be given a chance. Discrimination by age or gender is now a suable offense in the civilised world. We know this to be a verifiable fact in the UK for example.

vii. Employment agencies operating within the country must be prohibited from demanding registration fees from candidates. They can only be allowed to obtain a certain percentage of money from any potential employee after successfully securing a job for the person, and not before.

viii. In the view that most government agencies have the necessary resources to successfully conduct a recruitment process, they should be compelled to desist from using the services of fee-paying employment agencies to organise recruitments, or be made to bear the total cost of such services rendered by the recruitment agencies.

We also call on well meaning Nigerians, the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), the Trade Union Congress (TUC), Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Senior Staff Association of Nigeria Universities (SSANU), Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) and all tertiary institutions trade unions, Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), oil and gas workers trade unions, Nigeria Medical Associations (NMA), Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT), National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) etc to support this cause. If we fail to fight this ugly menace now, the future of our unborn children will terribly be at stake.

May God continue to bless you Mr. President and endow you the wisdom to effectively pilot the affairs of the nation.

God bless Nigeria. Long Live Federal Republic of Nigeria.

thanks for that. bros,i believed dat this little fact we penetrating to their hearing.once again thanks.

10q bros for this, i think we should send this to the president facebook page

U spoke well comrade. It is indeed disheartening to learn that d greatest army in the world US Army lure their youths into the force by offering them scholarship while our army will ask you to pay b4 u apply yet u must have a godfather to b enlisted. When govt. agencies ask unemployed youths to pay b4 they can apply for jobs which they may not get probably because they dont have godfathers is demoralising to say d least. I for one wil NEVA EVA buy their scratch cards. I no go fall mugu 4 their scam. Shikena!

i think together we should continue to past it on the president's wall so it can catch his attention, things like this is only synonymous to Nigeria, the people who are supposed to grow,prune and serve the wine are already drunk with it to a fault..that their original purpose has been drowned and lost....May the God Lord Help Nigeria....

I think we should all this piece on Mr presidents facebook page and submit it also to all the Newspaper houses, ...
would send a soft copy to a friend whose Uncle is an editor in one of the major papers,,,,,,,,,,,,,

@ all concern Nigerians on the present waive of exploitation. We should not just stop at admiring the writer but make sure we this on all the pages of the so called aspirants of political office starting from the president to local government chairmen. Copy this and circulate as fast as posible using all medium avalilable. It's high time we started talking. Generations unborn rely on our voices. LET'S DO THIS TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE. Cheers

@chemistnd,dats a swt one there just as kblaze said,ds should b posted 2 mr.presidents f/book n also it wil b beta if most news dailies wil hav ds most expecialy d guardian newspaper.tanks man

This is good , am glad they are Nigerians who share my thoughts too. I was highly maltreated at the current FRSC recruitment exercise by FRSC officials for no offense even after we had to pay for the recruitment forms. Nigeria needs a drastic change, i just hope Goodluck listens and acts accordingly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by chidianya

@chemistnd,dats a swt one there just as kblaze said,ds should b posted 2 mr.presidents f/book n also it wil b beta if most news dailies wil hav ds most expecialy d guardian newspaper.tanks man

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According to the CNN publication,Goodluck Jonathan: The Facebook president, the man really is a FB Presido. From another unknown source I heard that Jonathan actually reads comment dropped by his 246,000 and counting friends on FaceBook :o :o, so let all us spam his FB page with this message ;D ;D, maybe he will do something about it. Just say it is a pre-requisite for voting him come next year polls

Certainly am flagablasted and sad at the demand from recruitment agencies. If I should hv my way i would ask for a refund of all money collected back to those who have paid. I want to use this medium to ask all solidarities and active recognised philantropist to schedule a date for a peaceful demonstration by all unemployed graduate to march to Aso rock protesting that it is high time we get government grant of a token sum of money monthly for upkeep and to start small business. Dont we knw that in developed and some developing countries, stipence and incentives ard given to graduate to manage their lifes b4 a white corlla job arise? Men! We have to do something now. I dont mind spare-heading the movement to my state Governor, if ex-millitant are trained and empowered financially, then why should ours be the reverse? Pls drop a comment with me if you are ready to change these co-motion: [email protected] Long live Nigeria! Long live the Jobbless !

@dan. I'm strongly behind u. My email is [email protected]. I wil personaly print as many copies as posible of dis post and dem anywhere my hands and legs get2.do u knw i atendd an interview and afta scalin tru dfirst stage ,at dsekond stage i was told dat i was ova aged..for djob..haba

u talk true we hope say the president will address the issue

Top top post! A lot of passion in this letter. I hope they read it.

@All

I am really happy dat there are pple in dis forum who dont think we shld discuss only issues dat directly affect recruitment bt ones dat also affect it indirectly, by dat i mean d future of dis country.
What is d place of d youths in dis country?
I am surprised at how Govt agencies dat "sing" d rule of law sometyms close their eyz to it wen it isnt favorable.

Few weeks back,I remember reading in one of the dailies dat a Lagos-based legal firm instituted a court action against FG and NDLEA.Requesting dat they refund money so far collected and start d whole recruitment process afresh. I am only surprised to read here dat they are continuing with d process,even in d face of d impending court case.

(Laments) WHICH WAY NIGERIA??

Interesting Write-up!
I hope copies of this has been dispatched/forwarded to the necessary quarters.

Nice one,the level of extortion is alarming,callous and evil.it is unimaginable how NDLEA AND FRSC fixed their exam on the same day,knowing fully well that majority of people applied for both.This is ungodly .God save this nation.

Why is it dat every thing pple in govt do in nigeria, dey donot think abt d common gud. Now labour wants to go on strike ova N18,000 min wage govt refused to pay workers when d foolish representathieves are all collecting millions as allowance. Sometimes i wished d british never left. Mayb we wud have been as developed as south africa or even beta off than ds contraption called Nigeria.

Tanx bro,well said.U ve made my day! D onus is on d applicants 2 shun any form of xploitatn nd b proactv in our thought nd deed.also d issue of nysc cert. as prerequisite 4 bn shortlistd is inimical as teemng gradu8 frm part tme prog ar in view of dis bng treatd as 3rd clas citizen.finally comrades, we shud kip talkng,shun violenz nd seek revolutn of d mind nd b ready to vote dem out of office if dey fail to listen 2 ds outcry.