The 52-year-old National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) discharged the 2024 Batch C Stream II after completing their one-year mandatory service, making them the final of approximately 400,000 young graduates it mobilizes each year. As a result, the young graduates’ realities and uncertainties about their future have increased.
Recall that the passing out procession was held nationwide on Thursday, December 18, 2025, for the Batch C Stream II of 2024 session, who were released following a year of mandatory service.
Some of the hurdles that may impede post-NYSC career chances for some of the discharged corps members include the country’s severe economic circumstances, sustainable seed capital, and the realities of academic training mismatch for a few viable occupations.
It was revealed that several of the discharged corps members in the federation’s states are afraid of their employment prospects. Since the government’s N77,000 monthly allowance and corps employers’ pittance had been seized since the end of the month, several voiced bitterly how they would proceed if the anticipated engagement was delayed.
Conversely, some of them said they were hopeful about using their lifetime careers to support themselves.
Eno Okonnah, a female corps member and University of Calabar English Language graduate, bemoaned that the quantity of her colleagues assigned to the school as Place of Primary Assignment made it impossible for her to stay at the private school where she served.
Ondo State University of Medical Sciences graduate Abigail Omotunde expressed doubt as the post-NYSC reality became apparent to her.
“The passing-out, end of service, and thoughts about what next had preoccupied my mind in the last two months,” she stated. I have a background in fashion design, hospital equipment marketing, and hair styling.
“I’ll make a decision within the next two weeks. During my time as an undergraduate, I operated a modest store, and now I work privately on campus, catering to both my coworkers and local clients. To keep running the business and make ends meet, I need the seed money,” she stated.
Growing the number of graduates
The number of qualified graduates mobilized for the country has fluctuated over time due to a variety of factors, including government admission policies, backlogs from strikes or academic disruptions, university and polytechnic graduation rates, the efficiency and effectiveness of school administrators, and the school calendar.
The NYSC program regularly recruited between 350,000 and 400,000 corps members in its three yearly batches of A, B, and C. As a result, managers of the only post-Civil War organization still in existence had to make adjustments to deal with the increasing number of graduates trained locally and others from the Diaspora on employment generation.
The Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) program was introduced in 2012 to supplement the curriculum as a result of the issues.
In addition to the yearly automatic employment provided to exceptional corps members by governments and employers of labor, the SAED has supplemented the various efforts of both the federal and state governments in facilitating in-camp and post-camp skills acquisition training for corps members, according to a scheme official who wished to remain anonymous.
The official stated that the NYSC/corporate partnership model continues to be a crucial pillar of Nigeria’s job creation and youth empowerment strategy, particularly for post-service employment and entrepreneurship, when discussing corporate partnerships in employment generation for the army of graduates mobilized annually for the scheme.
He revealed that the SAED/corporate partnerships strategy has provided training and start-up cash to thousands of corps members every year.
Standardized Training in Entrepreneurship
The Director General (DG) of the Scheme, Brigadier-General Olakunle Nafiu, revealed plans to restructure the Skill Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) training for Corps Members by standardizing the curriculum for greater impact during the second SAED stakeholders’ summit in Abuja in 2025.
With over 30,000 companies officially registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) and over 3.18 million Corps Members trained in entrepreneurship and job preparedness since 2012, he characterized the SAED program as a cornerstone of youth empowerment in Nigeria.
The DG further disclosed that Corps members were being integrated into the Federal Government’s 3 Million Technical Talent (3MTT) program and international remote work opportunities via programs like the SAED SME toolkit, NYSC jobs.ng, and Outsource to Nigeria.
The founder of Ayodeji Megbope Inspires Mentoring Academy, Mrs. Ayodeji Megbope, advised discharged corps members not to be influenced by the nation’s much-discussed economic problems in an interview, claiming that astute minds can achieve breakthroughs.
“Your possibilities are limitless if a woman who started at 40 with N1000, with kids made fun of for stew-smelling uniforms, standing at a school gate hawking moin-moin, can rise to own a restaurant and now a Wellness Center,” she stated.
All discharged corps members were urged by Mrs. Megbope to overcome their anxiety of what lay ahead, develop their abilities, gain competence, and set themselves up for long-term success.
