The youth of a country
are its greatest assets. During my last visit to Nigeria, I saw that asset at
work. Many of these youths are working hard to earn a living; others are
sitting comfortably waiting for manna to fall free of charge. One example of
such hardworking youths was the taxi driver who took me from the airport to the
city of Abuja.
You can tell that life
is not easy for this young man. Despite the obvious hardship and difficulty he
was going through, he remains optimistic. What made his story even more
interesting was that there are thousands of youths like him who feel too big to
do the kind of business he is engaged in to earn a living.
On our way to the city,
I became curious about the story of this driver. I asked him to tell me more about
his experience in life. It turned out that he is a graduate from the University
of Port Harcourt. After searching for job endlessly, he decided to take his
life in his own hands. He asked his uncle who works in the United States for
help. The uncle decided to buy a taxi for him.
What impressed me the
most is that he has big ambitions. He was using the taxi as a means of making
connections, so that one day he could meet the right person who would help him
find the right job, or engage him in a business. When he makes a break through,
he intends to support his family, establish a successful business- and as you
might guess-achieve the dream of many Nigerians, ‘travel abroad.’ I don’t blame him, many of us grew up hoping
to travel, study or live abroad.
Having ‘connections’ or
‘long leg’ are words/phrases you commonly hear among our youths. Our society
has sacrificed merit so much that people believe that their effort will never
bring success. For one to make it, he has to know somebody, who knows someone
somewhere, before he could be fixed in the right place. Largely, people have a
point, but they are not completely right. As I told many of the youths I spoke
with, favour has a limit. If you work hard, pray and remain consistent, one day
your chance will come.
With Nigeria officially
in recession, I believe Nigerian youths have a great opportunity. The
opportunity to create businesses that could provide income for them and provide
jobs for others. Some of the best inventions and businesses in the world were
created during recession.
In today’s essay, I
would like to look at innovation as a mechanism for Nigerian youth to get themselves
out of the economic recession that is biting hard.
In doings so, I would
like to share the story of one of the most interesting innovations of this
century. The story of the hotel chain, Airbnb.
I chose the story of
Airbnb because it is a simple innovation that turned into a multibillion-dollar
industry, estimated to be worth $25 billion.
Airbed and breakfast,
the full name of the company was an idea conceived by students in San Francisco
who were struggling to pay rent and earn a decent living. Like the taxi driver
who drove me from the airport, they decided to take their lives in their own
hands. However, what is even more impressive was they didn’t think about ‘connections’
and ‘long leg’. They look at the opportunities in the city, and decided to
create a business out of these.
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