Jigawa at 30 years And The Issues Within -By Umar Farouk

I have no reason not to be steadfast, focused and diligent in the service of my State. We are thrown into the bliss of courage, faith, creativity, magnitude and boundless hope to contribute our quota for our State defence and building.

We are praying dearly for peace because peace is an essential ingredient to life and to development. We have been praying dearly for our unity. We look ourselves with the eyes of love and the hearts of humanity.

Today, we are celebrating the 30years after Jigawa was created from Kano State. So, right now at this critical juncture, the question we should ask ourselves is, our State currently structured and standing in an inverted pyramid shaped?

Let’s look at this statistics!

The report which was based on the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data, Jigawa is one of the frontrunner in the National poverty race. It said ‘’At the end of may 2020, Jigawa State had about 87.02% peoples living in an extreme poverty, high than Sokoto and Taraba only with 87.73% and 87.72% respectively. Also as quoted by PwC report, Q4 2020 witnessed an estimated over 55.4% of young people aged 18 to 35 are unable to find suitable work to earn a living.

The natural temptation is to gloss over this reports because it relays an obvious truth It doesn’t require any statistical validation, since the assessment of mass poverty is not an exact science. If you lived in the State you can give accurate explanations and analogies to describe this highly dreaded term. We cannot shy away from the fact that peoples sleep and wake in poverty. This without ado is evident in the life expectancy rate which has over the years dwindled on a downward scale.

To have a bird’s eye view of the foregoing opinion, visit any second hand goods market where furniture, electronics and household items are sold, and see how some people are selling their properties just to survive.

Also another report by FMOE say “Jigawa State is currently the 4th State with highest number of out of school children with around 784,391 children rooming on the streets”. The children we’re neglecting today will come back to kidnapped and killed us tomorrow. The security issues did not just start today, it take years of neglect of the working-age population leads to this. Without a working system, proper educational mprovements we’ll continue to experience insecurities.

Moreover, there are no vital means of rescuing the rapidly deteriorating intellectual and moral visions regarding young people to imagine vital policies, values, opportunities and social relations that can invoke adult responsibility and reinforce the ethical imperative to provide them with the much needed economic, social and educational conditions that will make their lives livable and their future sustainable.

Youths unemployment rate incresing anually. Thousands of youths graduate, able bodied men and women with high intellectual capabilities and physical strength into the labour market. They roam about the streets with their certificates begging for jobs, leaving them with no opportunities.

Youths require a surfeit of decent education, employment opportunities, other socio-economic and political conditions that can enable them have respectable standard and quality of life.

Our stakeholders need to quickly find a solution to poverty and unemployment.

May God Bless Jigawa State.

Umar writes from Jigawa he can reached via 07032843368