Abia’s unemployment rating, a danger foretold
By Ogbonnaya Ikokwu
Abia’s high unemployment rating has continued to elicit reactions since the last survey by the the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) was made public.
The report stated that Abia leads the chart with an unemployment rate of 18.7 per cent, followed closely by the FCT with 14.1 per cent, and Rivers with 13.4 per cent.
The NBS survey revealed that approximately 362,000 individuals were unemployed in the state, despite significant number being engaged in the informal and self-employment sectors.
According to the report, Abia’s workforce includes over 1.25 million self-employed people, while 1.51 million are in informal employment, reflecting a heavy reliance on these sectors as formal job opportunities remain scarce.
Although, the revelation made by NBS through its Nigeria Labour Force Survey Q1 2024 is alarming, it has justified concerns raised by Gov. Alex Otti about the ailing Abia’s economy in the run up to the 2023 General Elections.
Gov. Alex Otti had warned at that time that Abia would be heading toward a failed state, if the electorate made any mistake in their choice of their governor at the poll.
The debt profile of the state had increased from N45 billion, from the administration of ex-Gov. Theodore Orji, to N150 billion during the Okezie Ikpeazu’s administration.
Then, the unemployment rate in the was also among the highest in the country. Abia was also ranked 32nd in the ease of doing business, which meant that an investor had to consider 31 other states first before thinking of coming to Abia.
Given the above backdrop, it is important to point out that the NBS survey in question was equally conducted in the year 2023.
It is not surprising that Abia recorded the highest rate of unemployment because the immediate past Peoples Democratic Party led-government treated employment in the state with kid gloves.
The three successive governors, including Ikpeazu, had failed to build solid road infrastructure to encourage private business concerns in Aba, the commercial hub of the state, to thrive.
Instead, they resorted to arbitrary offer of employment in the Local Government, state ministries, agencies and parastatals.
Job offers in the civil service were seen as the dividend of democracy, until the state’s workforce became overbloated with homongous wage bill.
Ikpeazu did nothing strategic to address the situation in his eight years in office, rather he added to the problem by giving his cronies the opportunity to employ more people into the civil service than the system and financial capacity of the state could carry.
Many Abia residents were given jobs, some were later sacked after working for over one year without pay, just like the teachers’ employment saga of 2019 – all these happened under his watch.
The employment racketeering continued until the dying minutes of the his administration when over 12,000 names were padded to the payroll of the state, following his executive waiver.
Apart from job offers in the civil service, political appointments became another avenue for job settlement for loyal boys in the state.
Many youths took to praise singing for politicians just to be appointed Senior Assistants, Senior Special Assistants and Special Advisers.
Most of this appointments were given to fresh graduates and even secondary school leavers, who had no experience to advise the governor or any other person on any matter of governance.
Meanwhile, the administration owed some workers, regarded as uncore civil servants, a blacklog of salary arrears, amounting to N18 billion, which Gov. Otti’s administration is still grappling to offset.
The pensioners in the state were not left out as they were neglected and owed 45 months of pension arrears.
While all that persisted, Aba was left to deteriorate. Many local manufacturer and fabricators closed shop due to the lack of good roads to their factories.
More than 50 companies shut down on the Osisioma Ekeakpara Road axis alone. The area, which was a hub of industrial concerns in the 1970s and 1980s became a swamp because the road was unattended to. Businesses, ranging from manufacturing to banking, hospitality, housing and education closed as a result of the neglect of the all-important road.
The Aba Port Harcourt Road, which was also a major hub for all manner of fabrications, tuned into a riverine area because of unchecked flooding, forcing business owners in the area to take their businesses elsewhere outside Aba.
On another count, the high rate of insecurity, which hit the city, when some jobless youths took to kidnapping between 2009 and 2010, left a deadly blow on the city. Many businessmen, who fled the city, never returned even after the military operation and prayers that helped to restore peace in the city.
Again, many harsh economic realities, particularly the lack of regular power and high cost of diesel and petrol, adversely affected the manufacturing sector, forcing many companies to either downsize or close down outright, thereby throwing their workers back to the labour market.
Since the embargo on employment in the state civil service is still in force, the only way out of the current quagmire of unemployment bedevilling the state is to encourage private sector driven economy.
This is where Gov. Otti’s
policy thrust of building a strong private sector driven economy is pointing to.
It is gratifying to know that since the inception of the administration, the governor has embarked on a comprehensive road construction, with the intention of turning every community in the state into viable production centre, where those who seek jobs can find one and those who dream of setting up their independent empires will be given wings to fly.
Gov. Otti has demonstrated that
one of the most important commitments of the Labour Party-led government is to improve the living conditions of the people across rural and urban communities through the consistent removal of the many impediments that limit the capacity of individuals and businesses to function at their full potentials.
He has also promised that no part of the state would be left behind in his administration’s push to expand the frontiers of economic and social opportunities for individuals, families and businesses.
The cost of neglect of rural/urban roads on the economy of the state, in terms of lost opportunities, cannot be quantified.
Farmers in rural communities will find it difficult to move their produce to the markets leading to heavy post-harvest losses.
Most painfully, businessmen and women from different parts of Nigeria and the West African sub-region, who had relied on markets in Aba for supplies, quickly took their patronage to other places.
When business returns plummeted, several commercial entities that previously employed thousands of our people, quietly closed shop or relocated.
In his quest for a business friendly environment for investors, the governor had introduced the single tax payment system. The policy has eliminated all forms of double taxation, together with its financial burden on businesses in the state.
The agricultural sector, which was neglected by the previous administrations, is also receiving adequate attention by the present administration.
Recently, 298 young Abia men and women, were sponsored for a training at the CSS Farms in Nasarawa State. Upon their completion of training, the State Government disbursed an interest-free agric loan to them and charged them to train other farmers in their respective communities and Local Government Areas.
The State Government had also announced plans to recover government-owned farm settlements concessioned to private individuals and hand them over to investors to encourage mechanised farming in the state.
It is expected that the government would pursue all its policies geared towards encouraging private sector participation in the running of the economy to a logical conclusion in order to create an enabling environment for ailing and dead businesses to come back to life, thereby reducing the population of the unemployed in the state.
The Federal Government should also study the NBS survey and give job seekers in Abia higher slots in the jobs President Bola Tinubu has promised to create in his Independence Anniversary speech on October 1.
Again, the Federal Government should encourage the Geometric Power Plant through speedy supply of gas to fire its turbines for regular power in Aba and its environs. This will spur investors to develop interest in bringing their businesses back to Aba.
Of course, given that unemployment stalls economic growth of any society, Abia will certainly win the battle over the hydra-headed monster because the present political leadership in the state has demonstrated the will and capacity to tame the tide.
#Gov. Otti is Building the new Abia!
#To God be glory!
Ogbonnaya Ikokwu, a journalist and public affairs analyst, writes from Umuahia.