Olusegun Obasanjo
Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, has raised an alarm over the
growing state of unemployment in Nigeria, urging the federal, state and local
governments to do more in the area of employment. The former president sounded the warning while speaking at
the 10th anniversary and 6th and 7th convocation ceremonies of Tai Solarin University
of Education, TASUED, Ijagun, Ijebu Ode.
He warned that:
“If there is no job for the unemployed to feed themselves and also to contribute to the development of the country, then, we will all be sitting on gun powder.
“If university education was not for development then, it was not serving any useful purpose. It must be for development, personal, local, national and even global and that is very important.”
Obasanjo advised:
“I believe in lifelong education. Nobody should stop learning until he or she die.”
He stated that education is a meal ticket for anybody that
has it, adding that it is also a means of breaking the poverty cycle.
Obasanjo was honoured with an Honorary Doctorate of
Education in Political Science while HID Awolowo was honoured with Honorary
Doctorate in Business Education and Aliko Dangote was conferred with Honorary
Doctorate in Science and Business Education. HID Awolowo’s daughter, Mrs Tola
Adeniran, received the award on her late mother’s behalf.
Speaking about the award, Obasanjo said he accepted it
because of the personality the school was named after, saying that Tai Solarin
was one of the greatest educationists the country has ever produced.
He also told the audience that he was honoured to be
honoured in conjunction with Chief Hannah Idowu Dideolu Awolowo, insisting,
“Anywhere Mama is being honoured, we must join hands to honour her.”
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