The rate of graduate unemployment across Africa is quite disturbing. According to a 2014 British Council report on “higher education and job crisis in Africa”, it takes a university graduate five years on average to secure a job in Kenya. In Ghana, 1 in 3 graduates end up unemployed. In Nigeria, 15.3% of youth with advanced education are unemployed. Today, over 1800 colleges in Africa churn out 10 million graduates every year, but over half of them have no hope of jobs, let alone jobs that pay good wages, provide a good measure of job security or offer skills development opportunities. Today, too many of Africa’s talented graduates see no option but to travel overseas and settle for menial jobs (assuming they are lucky to find one in today’s world). In Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa, it is not uncommon to see young people who were top graduating students riding
Okada or
Keke Napep or staying jobless for many years after graduation.