Data from the Ghana Statistical Service from the 2021 Population and Housing Census shows that 13.4 per cent of Ghana’s active population is unemployed. Every year, thousands of students graduate from the various tertiary institutions in Ghana, and only a handful get temporary or permanent employment. Amid these facts, the government has urged fresh graduates to find innovative ways of becoming entrepreneurs.
During a recent career fair organized by the Member of Parliament for Anyaa Sowutuom Constituency and Pentecost University College, the Minister of Information, Hon. Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, the special guest of honour, reiterated that university students should go into entrepreneurship as it is the only way to gain employment right after school.
Matters Arising
In 2011, some angry and frustrated youth in the country came together to form the Unemployment Association Ghana because of the government’s inability to provide jobs for them. Last year during a Job Fair at the Accra International Conference Center, I met a 37-year-old unemployed graduate. He stated that he had been searching for a job for the past 13 years but got part-time jobs.
At the same event, I met a 28-year-old unemployed graduate who lamented his inability to land a job after five years of completing school. These are only a few of the instances that reveal the rate of unemployment in the country, leaving the youth puzzled and pointing fingers at the government for its failure to salvage the situation.
The Cankers
In a recent interview with the CEO of the National Youth Authority, Hon. Pius Enam Hadzide, stated that tertiary institutions’ enrollment had gone up by 5%. The government and tertiary institutions have expanded the educational system to produce more graduates without creating an environment to employ them. In addition, the innovation and entrepreneurship training to make these students self-employed have been ignored.
Interacting with another unemployed university graduate, he corroborated that the academic curriculum of Ghana has ignored entrepreneurship and innovation as they have been trained to be job seekers rather than job creators. He further added that in almost the 48 courses studied at the university only one was dedicated to entrepreneurship.
Undeniably, the private sector in Ghana is the driving force of our economy, but the government does not create an enabling environment for them to create more opportunities for the citizens. Businesses in the country cannot thrive when there is limited access to funding, unstable and costly electricity, high tax rates, and rigid and unfavourable customs and trade regulations.
Government Inability To Create Sustainable Jobs
The government has initiated several programs to salvage the unemployment situation in the country. Programs such as NABCO, Planting for Food and Jobs, National Entrepreneurship, and National Youth Authority initiatives have been rolled out to that effect yet the unemployment rate keeps on skyrocketing despite the government boasting of having created jobs.
These interventions by the government have collapsed with the existing ones not fulfilling their purpose of establishment. NABCO trainees are being sacked with little being infused into the system. Every two years, youth employment agencies lay off workers they employ. With all the resources at the disposal of the government, which has failed to sustain businesses, what then is the fate of the unemployed graduate who finds it difficult to feed themselves?
More so, if the government has decided to slam entrepreneurship in the face of the youth then it should as well invest more in entrepreneurship training and education in our schools.