The inability of government and other stakeholders to effectively harness the informal sector and its potentials for job creation is stalling efforts at eradicating unemployment, writes MESHACK IDEHEN.
For several years now, the Federation of Informal Workers of Nigeria (FIWON), has been trying to get the Federal and state governments to recognise them as a major factor to consider in the battle to reduce or eliminate unemployment from the country.
However, to the federation, the reverse seems to be the case, as the members insisted that not only have they been ignored by the government, but that their little but concrete contributions towards job creation were not been supported by relevant government agencies.
Recently, FIWON had publicly declared that Federal Government's promise to end unemployment in the country should not be taken seriously by Nigerians, as they are still wondering how the government intends to grapple with the scourge of unemployment in a sustainable manner without carrying them along.
General Secretary of FIWON, Mr. Gbenga Komolafe, told National Mirror that the 370,000 jobs that experts said the federation is capable of creating annually have not materialised, because all the promises of support made to the group by the government have not been fulfilled.
He lamented that more than one year after President Goodluck Jonathan made the promises to effect a 25 per cent cut in the basic salaries of all political office-holders in the executive arm of government, and to review the number of committees, commissions and parastatals with overlapping responsibilities with a view to restructuring them and using the financial savings to support job creation efforts, that nothing has been done in that regards.
Following the alarm consistently being raised by FIWON, some analysts told our correspondent that not carrying FIWON along in job creation programmes by governments will make any effort put into eradicating unemployment have very minimal effect.
They based their opinion on the fact that several researches have shown that nearly 80 per cent of the country's population are involved in some form of informal businesses or trade; and little support from the government to the informal workers can cause a positive boom in the nation's economy, thereby creating jobs through its multiplier effects.
Citing the example of China, the former Managing Director of Errand Express Limited, Mr. Sunny Agboju, said the economic boom in that Asian country is directly linked to the activities of workers in the informal sector, many of whom he described are artisans and vocationally trained entrepreneurs.
Agboju said though the unkept promises of government and other stakeholders to the informal sector should not be a surprise, adding that "Rome was not built in a day".
According to him, before the present administration came on board, various initiatives have been conceptualised and implemented by past governments with the objective of reducing or eliminating unemployment, the majority of which never worked or even saw the light of day, as unemployment seems to continually have the upper hand in the battle to eliminate it.
On his part, while making reference to the Youth Empowerment Scheme that was launched with much fanfare last year by the Federal Government, Vice Chairman of Broron Group, Mr. Henry Ojogho, said the Subsidy Reinvestment Programme (SURE-P), which was conceptualised to generate jobs has not achieved much, and that workers operating at informal levels need to be supported and empowered, if the boom in job creation the country is working towards is to be achieved.
Ojogho, who said his company recently brought in some South Korean entrepreneurs to invest in the building and construction industry, said investors and entrepreneurs in that sector of the economy depended heavily on workers in the informal sector.
According to him, "It is important to worry about the plight of the informal workers in the Federal Government's initiative to establish a sustainable employment generating pattern. It is also critical that government initiates an integrated social security scheme for them, so that the approach towards creating jobs through them can be a comprehensive approach to the scheme".
Indeed, it would be recalled that FIWON had also urged the government to begin a social security scheme for informal workers, in order to fully integrate them in whatever schemes the government may come up with.
Management Consultant and member of the Nigeria Institute of Management, Mr. Benson Enikhoume, said that the informal economy accommodates the poor workers including retrenched workers from the formal sector, as well as millions of graduates of the nation's colleges, polytechnics, universities who could not find jobs in the formal sector.
He noted that it was the conviction of FIWON and affiliates that minimal steps initiated by government can go a long way to tackling the monster of unemployment, adding Nigeria will go a long way to benefit from it by having better physical, economic and spiritual environment to live in.
"Informal workers lack access to health insurance, old age, accident, and disability insurance, apart from problems such as lack of access to vocational training, business credits amongst others.
They are also victims of constant harassment especially from local and state governments. "Informal workers are demobilised with the informal workplaces and businesses, in the name of urban renewal and environmental sanitation, these are the areas they want government to address," he said.
