Following President Muhammadu Buhari’s gaffe that Nigerian youths are a lazy lot, Presidential aspirant, Kingsley Moghalu, on Thursday lambasted him, saying unemployment climbed from 8.2 per cent to 18.8 per cent in three years of his administration.
Moghalu, who earlier in the year declared his intention to contest in the 2019 presidential election, further said that the youths, whom Buhari described as lovers of freebies, are “making the most of what has been left for them, which is nothing”.
In a post on his Instagram Page, Moghalu said,
Dear @muhammadubuhari, Nigerian youths are not waiting for handouts. They are making the most of what has been left for them, which is nothing.
Under your administration, unemployment has climbed from 8.2% in Q2 2015, to 18.8% now. Many want to work, but they have no opportunities.
The presidential hopeful further added
“I’ll state this clearly: young people are Nigeria’s richest raw material. We must invest in them to harness the best of their talents to make this country reach its full potentials. Our youth have achieved a lot with the little they’ve been given, but we can do better. A nation cannot reap what it did not sow, and our woeful investment in education and youth development must change if we want to be the best of the best.”
Buhari had come under fire on Thursday for criticising youths who he said “do nothing” and want everything for “free”.
Buhari made the remark on Wednesday at a business conference in London.
“A lot of them haven’t been to school and they are claiming, you know, that Nigeria has been an oil producing country, therefore, they should sit and do nothing and get housing, health care, education, free,” said Buhari.
The comment touched a nerve West Africa’s largest economy, which suffers from high unemployment and lacks basic government services, including running water and electricity.
Most business and homes rely on private generators for power and buy water privately.
Former Nigerian vice president Atiku Abubakar, who is also running for president, lambasted Buhari.
“I will never refer to Nigeria’s youth as people who sit and do nothing,” he said in a statement posted on Facebook, adding that youth are the “backbone” of the country.
Another presidential hopeful Adamu Garba said Buhari was being “humorous with our national pride”.
On Thursday morning, the hashtag #LazyNigerianYouths was trending on Twitter, with young Nigerians blasting the government.
“The government never created anything for me, I feed from my hustle and yet they say we are lazy,” said one tweet.
