Our youths!
Are not only ready
But also ever desperate
To work, to earn, to feed
Without minding the nature
Of that kinds of jobs available
For them to do in order to survive
Roaming the streets like scavengers
Working like elephants, getting poor rewards.
Hawkers
Inside the traffic
Selling water, snacks
Daring death, fearing not
Running after bikes, cars, lorries
Dribbling like Ronaldo in between
Molue, danfo, oko asewo and my car
Are not alliens but from within, among us
Many of them had served the land after graduation
Hoping to bring their certificates out of the box one day
The Surulres had settled for such undignified jobs
The Olorunsogos are forced into robbery, kidnapping, cyber crimes, money rituals.
However, no youths folding arms, waiting for free food.
Uncountable
In different markets
Owode Onirin, Idumota
Computer village, Ladipo, Aba
Alaba, Onitsha, Chinese Markets
Our youths are always hardworking
Many do three different jobs in a day
Working like mad in the land of honey
Yet living like pauper, looking not well fed
Our youths are illegal emigrants
Searching for greener pastures
Millions of them now in the Europe
United States, Asia, Scandinavia, Africa
Scrambling for citizenship, work permits
Many had been deported umpteenth times
Still manoeuvring to sneak out there
To settle for menial jobs, peanuts
Unhappy, unsatisfied, but no option
The lazy youths are not here
Seems they are not yet born
Really, they don't exist
In our midst
At all.
Education
Many parents
Could not afford
To pay the bills all alone
Many orphans are in the universities,
struggling to become somebody in life
Against all the odds, glueing to prayers
Gallivanting from one hill to cathedral
Fasting, resuming marathon vigils daily
Ignorantly, falling into the hands of fox
Camouflaging in the clergy's garments
The gluttons in power often insensitive
Busy increasing the bills, owing salaries
Bastardising public school education
By promoting incessant strike actions
Establishing private ones on hectares
I'm still searching
For the lazy youths
Do I need a binocular?
Search engine or compass?
Or sharp lens like a crystal ball?
Ok, maybe they are not yet here
Or maybe they aren't yet being born
Or the power lied against their existence
The lazy youths are neither here nor born.
If the youth are lazy
The leaders are lazier,
Even greedier than tortoise
More selfish beyond description
Give no space for the youths to grow
In their various cabinets, departments
Monopolising, cornering every opportunity
Among the tired and aged strikers and their allies
Who were the beneficiaries
Of the free education, free health care?
The so-called leaders in power and who
During their days in the universities
Never cooked nor paid for accommodation
Eat free food like birds in a rice plantation
Alas! They all gang against this generation
Very impossible for the innocent youths
To live, to achieve in the land of paradoxical plenty
Propaganda, hollowed promises are the prevalence.
Unlike then
No more scholarships
For the poor students
For the outstanding ones
School fees become Herculean task
The youths are still struggling to feed
To live, to learn, to survive, to belong
Feeding is now as difficult as digging for gold
Government's presence is hard to feel or taste
The youths are creating jobs where there is none.
It's a pity!
That the leaders
Are trying to shift
The blames of their
Failure, shortcomings
On the ever dutiful youths.
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