by Femi Abegunde
What do you do for a living? If many Nigerian youths are asked this type of question, one may get answers like, I’m an entrepreneur, I’m into real estate, I do fashion designing and I sell things online. I am this, I’m that, even with no evidence. Nigerian youths will jump from forex trade to crypto currency to content creation to data analysis and on and on. That’s why at almost 30, many still don’t know what they’re doing with their lives. Why? No enabling environment. Sigh.
Many wake up every day doing this and that not because they love doing them but because they just want to survive by every means possible as long as it brings food to the table. They end up having multiple incomes that go into daily expenses and unforeseen bills. Why? No enabling environment. Sigh.
Many have turned into SAKAMANJES, lying and claiming to be what they are not. I’m talking about a self-acclaimed realtor, advertising on social media and showing how he just sold millions of naira worth of properties but has never dealt with a single client before. I’m talking about an online cloth vendor posting that she makes deliveries nationwide and has no single goods of her own. What about a boastful professional fashion designer that has no machine with which she operates. Everybody is doing something but nothing. Could this be because they believe breakthroughs can come at any time and so want to appear as professionals through lies? Of course, we are in Nigeria. Anything goes. No enabling environment. Sigh.
Putting this to you clearly, no doubt we have many dedicated youths who honestly want to make a living in the one thing they know how to do best and believe in. But the small profit vanishes into the high cost of surviving and unforeseen expenses that approach them every day like hungry vampires ready to devour and suck off all the blood in the body. Virtually everything is on the high side and only the real strong privileged can make a decent living. No enabling environment. Sigh.
It was when I went for an event decoration job in one of the biggest places in Lagos State that I realized how some are indeed shielded from all that is happening. Maybe they just chose not to see. I’m talking about the BIG BELLY BROTHERS who have no clue how hot the struggles are, for the majority. Their one-day-spending is another man’s life-time-savings.
Yet, we cannot take out the fact that many were born with a silver spoon and so the opposite for more. Many silver spoons have rusted and so have some risen from being paupers to becoming helpers. All is happening in the same environment that is not enabling. No enabling environment? This is just one excuse among others why you want to remain in the same place forever. We need to create our own environment. How? Trusting in God, faithful prayers and working smart are my strong recommendations. And the rest will be figured out.
