NYSC Has Failed, No Longer Meets Nigeria’s Needs – Sam Amadi

The Director of the Abuja School of Social Thought and Politics, Sam Amadi, has argued that the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) has outlived its original purpose, saying the scheme has fundamentally failed to address Nigeria’s current realities.

Speaking on Arise Television’s Morning Show on Friday, Amadi said the programme, which was created to promote national unity after the civil war, no longer delivers on its core objectives due to changing social and security conditions.

According to him, one of the biggest challenges facing the scheme is the tendency of influential Nigerians to influence where their children are posted, a practice he said undermines the fairness and purpose of the national service programme.

“Most elites now self-select. I can’t tell everybody who calls me from my village that my son is going for NYSC. I want him in Abuja, Lagos. Everybody self-selects, so that defeats the fundamental framework of the scheme,” he said.

Amadi also criticised the government’s inability to adequately protect corps members, noting that repeated reports of deaths and insecurity have weakened confidence in the programme.

He said many graduates now participate in the scheme reluctantly, partly because of the country’s challenging job market.

“I think that we need to tell ourselves the truth that this scheme has failed fundamentally. It worked in the past, but Nigeria’s problem is no longer about knowing how people in Kebbi behave. We have got enough of those samplings and symbolisms,” he stated.

The public affairs analyst maintained that graduate deployment should be driven primarily by safety considerations rather than the principle of equal distribution across states.

He argued that if any state is considered unsafe, corps members should simply not be posted there, insisting that national service should never come at the expense of participants’ lives.

“If Imo State is unsafe to deploy people, don’t deploy people because there is nothing that the state loses that year,” he said.

Amadi further proposed that the NYSC should become more selective instead of enrolling every graduate. He noted that the programme was created when the number of graduates was relatively small, but today’s expanding universities, polytechnics and colleges have significantly increased the number of prospective corps members.

He suggested reducing annual participation and transforming the scheme into a competitive national service programme reserved for graduates whose skills align with strategic national development priorities.

According to him, such an approach would restore the value and prestige of the scheme while ensuring it contributes more effectively to Nigeria’s development.

Amadi’s comments come just days after the Federal Government approved sweeping reforms to the NYSC, including extending the orientation programme to six weeks, introducing specialised skills training, improving security measures and repositioning the scheme as a platform for employability and entrepreneurship.