After 53 Years, NYSC Still Shaping Nigeria’s Unity and Growth
Joel Ajayi
Fifty-three years after its establishment, the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) has continued to leave an indelible footprint on Nigeria’s growth, national unity and youth development, the Minister of Youth Development, Ayodele Olawande, has said.
Olawande stated this on Friday in Abuja during the command performance and anniversary lecture organised to commemorate the 53rd anniversary of the scheme.
The Minister described the NYSC as Nigeria’s strongest platform for fostering unity, friendship and understanding across ethnic and religious divides, noting that the scheme has remained one of the country’s most respected national institutions since it was established in 1973.
According to him, the scheme has consistently promoted patriotism, integration and national cohesion by creating opportunities for young Nigerians from different backgrounds to live and work together across the country.
“The NYSC is truly the only story Nigeria is still writing about and a consistent platform for everybody that wants to grow, especially in the spirit of national unity,” he said.
Olawande noted that the scheme had helped countless Nigerians build lasting friendships beyond ethnic and religious boundaries despite the country’s diversity.
He further described the NYSC uniform as a symbol of sacrifice, patriotism, resilience and determination, stressing that corps members had contributed immensely to national development through services rendered in schools, hospitals, farms, rural communities and other public institutions nationwide.
The minister called on governors and other sub-national authorities to strengthen support for the scheme, saying states, local government councils and institutions continued to benefit from the contributions of corps members.
“There is no governor, local government council, school or institution that can do without this national scheme,” he stated.
He urged state governments to improve the welfare of corps members and integrate them into development programmes to enhance service delivery across the country.
Olawande also reaffirmed the Federal Government’s commitment to expanding opportunities for corps members through entrepreneurship, digital innovation, leadership development, skills acquisition and economic empowerment initiatives.
He commended the NYSC management for sustaining the scheme despite prevailing national challenges, including insecurity and socio-economic pressures.
Earlier, the Director-General of the NYSC, Olakunle Nafiu, said the anniversary offered an opportunity to reflect on the vision and contributions of the scheme to national development since inception.
Nafiu noted that the NYSC had remained a veritable platform for promoting national unity, integration and patriotism in the aftermath of the Nigerian Civil War.
He added that the deployment of graduates outside their states of origin had continued to strengthen peaceful coexistence and national cohesion among Nigerians.
The NYSC DG also highlighted the strategic roles played by corps members in elections, census exercises, health interventions, disaster response programmes and other national assignments.
Delivering the anniversary lecture, Professor Ope O. Ope Junior said the NYSC had made modest but significant contributions to national development and that the story of the scheme must continue to be told to Nigerians.
He argued that calls for the scrapping of the scheme should be discouraged, noting that the NYSC had shaped Nigeria’s history over the past five decades by promoting national unity, social cohesion and inter-group relations.
According to him, the scheme has also played a key role in redistributing manpower across the country.
However, he identified insecurity as one of the greatest challenges confronting the scheme, warning that continued insecurity could discourage parents from allowing their children to participate in national service.
“If you remove the caveat that NYSC is compulsory, most graduates may not go for national service,” he said.
Also speaking, the Director of Media and Chairman of the Anniversary Committee, Emeka Mgbemena, described the NYSC at 53 as a mature institution that had remained relevant despite challenges and repeated calls in some quarters for its scrapping.
The NYSC was established in 1973 by the administration of former Head of State, Yakubu Gowon, to promote reconciliation, reconstruction and national unity after the civil war.
