Salone Minefield: Unemployed Youths
In this country, even friendship in community leagues comes armed.
Because when ordinary football, community rivalry, neighborhood disagreements, or youthful banter can suddenly spark confrontation, the problem is bigger than the argument itself. A deeper problem has turned the country into a minefield.
Mines laid by failed policies, corruption, frustration, and youth unemployment.
And everywhere you look, young people are being asked to survive an economy that gives them too few opportunities, while politicians give them plenty of speeches. They are told to ‘trust the process,’ to be patient by people whose own futures are already secured. Told to remain peaceful while watching others turn public resources into private fortunes. Then we act surprised when tempers start running on all-wheel drive.
This is not an excuse for violence. It is an explanation of the pressure cooker.
A young person without meaningful work, without economic security and without confidence that tomorrow will be better is not merely unemployed. He or she is carrying frustration with nowhere productive to put it. That is the dangerous terrain. And bad governance keeps laying more mines.
We cannot keep treating every explosion as an isolated incident: It was just football. It was just politics. It was just an argument. They are just youths. No. The question is why the fuse was already so short.
A country cannot neglect its young people for years and then be shocked when anger becomes part of the national atmosphere. You cannot manufacture hopelessness and then demand unlimited patience from those living inside it.
One wrong word, one wrong turn, one wrong face at the wrong checkpoint… 💥 Boom. And when it happens, everybody suddenly discovers the importance of peace. Peace matters. But peace cannot simply mean asking frustrated young people to keep quiet while the conditions producing the frustration remain untouched.
We need more than condemnation after every confrontation. We need jobs. We need functioning institutions. We need accountability. We need opportunities that do not depend on political connections. We need leaders who understand that youth unemployment is not a statistic sitting quietly in a report. It is a social pressure building in real time.
The country is already a minefield. The question is whether those in charge will start removing the mines, or keep walking around pretending they cannot hear the ticking.
Footnote: Sadly, na di situation now na watin was once a vibrant intellectual country.
Theo Edwards for YAME Digital
