Youth unemployment: Here is my small advice

On Monday this week, I was flattered and flattened in almost equal measure.

On opening my mail, I found, among other correspondence, two letters from my young readers, from different parts of Kenya, asking me to find them jobs. Both were duly accompanied by CVs (biodata) and copies of academic and professional certificates.

I was flattered by the sincerity and openness of these youths, one a girl and one a boy, towards me. It was, of course, not the first time that I was being approached, especially in my Upper Hill community, about advice on finding a job. But most of these have been face-to-face, and I have counselled and connected as best I could.

The postal requests, however, coming through my readers’ mail, were a new phenomenon. Such mail is usually about matters I have written about, with comments, corrections or further information related to the topics in my articles. The warmest of these are from friends and acquaintances, reminding me of the times when and places where we had interacted, and how they relate to what I am writing now. 

Since I have not written recently about employment or unemployment, my correspondents’ letters were an indication that I am expected to be actively concerned about and with the daily struggles of my readers. I take this as recognition of my “wisdom” and my ability to offer practical “solutions” to everyday problems. This is flattering.

LET'S DIALOGUE

But what utterly flattened and depressed me was the realisation of the enormity and seriousness of the problem, and my relative inability to do anything significant about it. It is one thing seeing the statistics of youth unemployment in the country or knowing that many of our graduates “tarmac” for years on end without finding a job. But it is quite another confronting this in the form of a heart-rending account and appeal by a person affected by this situation.

I could not, however, just shrug off the appeals, or throw my arms up in the air and say there is nothing I could do about them. So, I thought I might start by sending brief personal replies to the young people who wrote to me.

Secondly, I felt it might help to share the problem with you, the larger community of my readers, with an appeal that you help out where you can.

Finally, I imagine that sharing with other young people the simple advice I gave to my correspondents might help to start a dialogue among all of us about this serious problem. Here is some of what I told my mail friends, by way of reply to their letters.  

Thank you for your kind and trusting letters and for sharing your employment and family problems with me. I was deeply touched, and I fully appreciate the frustrations of remaining without a job after such long, hard and expensive education and training.

I am sorry I cannot promise you any direct and immediate help, partly because I am myself rather ignorant of the industrial sector, and partly because I am currently out of the country. But I will try and mention your case to knowledgeable friends and acquaintances who might be able to advise you.

I must tell you that I am positively impressed by your initiative to reach out to people who you think might be able to help or advise. Keep up that enterprising spirit, and do not give up on looking for something to do. Most importantly, as our dear departed Grace Ogot used to say, never give up on hope.

Two other tactics I would like to share with you are: volunteering and creativity. Volunteering means that you do not always start by asking for jobs for which you will be paid. Try going out to work places where your training is relevant and offer to work “for free”, just as you did when you were doing your “practicals” or industrial attachment, I suppose.

You can tell the people in charge that you need to gain more experience, which you will anyway. More importantly, you and your abilities will be noticed, by both the people you are working with and their customers. It is quite likely that your volunteering work will lead to your being offered a paid job, either at your volunteering station or by other employers who notice it.

ENDLESS POSSIBILITIES

Creativity means looking imaginatively at our surroundings and seeing what we can do to improve them, and benefit ourselves. This is the road to self-employment. “Jua Kali” does not mean only producing endless lines of jikos and karais.

In my little corner of suburban Kampala, for example, I am encouraging young people to fabricate moulds, for making things like blocks, pavers and fencing posts. This is the direct result of an experience I had recently, when I went looking for concrete posts to fence off a little garden plot at the back of my house. The asking price at the industrial yards was Ugshs50,000 (nearly Sh2,000) per post. We certainly can produce cheaper posts with homemade moulds and readily available raw materials (like dust for sand) around us.

A few years ago, I read about two young men in Kisii who fabricated a simple wooden frame with a cardboard cover on top and simple chicken wire mesh on the sides.

Keeping newly hatched chicks inside this simple structure had the potential, I understand, to save over 90 percent of these pullets from kites and other predators that currently feast on them in our villages. This would enrich not only the rural fowl keepers but also the self-employed maker of the structures.

The possibilities are endless. Consider, for example, the potential usefulness and profit of effective incinerators and other garbage disposal tools in our mushrooming little towns. Even writing letters and other documents for the local communities can be a form of creative self-employment.

My editor and I remember the famous Somali novelist, Nuruddin Farah, narrating to us that he started his writing career by composing love letters for romantic neighbours who wanted to impress their heart-throbs!