“Should NYSC be scrapped or revamped?”

"Should NYSC be scrapped or revamped?"

If I had seen this question about a year ago, I might have said NYSC should be scrapped. To be candid I was one of the student in school who felt NYSC is a waste of time.

 

I remembered towards graduation, my big sister wanted me to leave the country; this is because I am a business strategist, I plan my business accurately and we were working things out, but as a food scientist, I hope to work with NAFDAC or SON someday in order to avoid my case being like that of Kemi Adeosun. I opted for service instead of leaving the country.

 

I had so many reasons not to go for camp, I remembered things I heard about camp. On getting there, there was enough reason to want to go back home.

 

The military personnel at the gate were rude to some people, treated some anyhow though they were nice to me.

Temi Badmus -NYSC

On entering the camp ground I felt happy, meeting nice people and all, collecting tag, registering for bank and all… Shouldn’t the government have used their sense to ensure all this bank registration be done online, those moment of lining up and all was really stressful.

 

Then the worst happened when I was given allocation, there was no socket which was functional in any of the rooms within my block, fortunately for me, the socket under my bunk was functional; the the next problem was sharing of kits, those kits were never anyone’s size and the next question I asked was why did we pen down our shoe size, polo sizes, and all if at the end of the day this is what we get to face?

 

I brought kits from home so I made use of all I brought except the NYSC uniform itself, which was of course oversize and I had to go reduce it at Mami; this was because I was my parade commander and I won’t want represent my platoon in a bad manner.

 

I can’t remember how time we practice the parade because of Gov. Sanwolu but he didn’t come, rather he sent One Mr Jimoh, which of course got me angry and all, to me it was like all effort wasted, we sent through all of that, the best he could have done was done in brief.

 

Let me cheap this in, that for two days before the swearing, I had not being eating food from the NYSC kitchen because I have heard a lot of stories and my body is very fragile, coupled with the fact that we had to line up every morning to take our bath, I can say this is one of the experience that made me understand more that life could have being worse.

 

It was fun, there were lot of competitions on camp ground which gave lots of corp members the chance to stand and say their truth and of course the chance to meet a lot of wayward people.

 

Those 21days moment on camp did determine a lot for many people – myself basically, was not the social type, I’m the book or writing type so I didn’t partake in anything dance, drama or anything relative to that, some did and I saw how happy they were. I was part of the debate of which myself and my mate won the debate for my platoon; I will love to state that the money for the debate which was a sum of N25, 000 was taken by our Platoon, we were happy we did something great for the Platoon.

 

Moreso, the Lagos State Coordinator, Mr Sunday Aroni dashed us ten thousand naria the next day, which was for us to enjoy.

 

A lot of things about camp was really interesting but a lot of things should be revamped too e.g the food, water, socket for charging (not everyone had money to charge and some of us are using highly expensive phones that we couldn’t afford to take to mami.

 

When we left camp, everyone knew the journey just started but to be sincere, the journey to far is full of experiences, learning, meeting new people, learning new things and it’s home away from home for so many of us.

 

To be sincere, NYSC should just be revamped, it’s a great period of one year of you are a graduate who know exactly what you want out of life, one thing I feel the government need to work on again is checking out on corp members which I’m sure is the duty of local inspector to avoid situation where corp members are being abused by companies.

 

Lastly, government official really need to let the youth know they take us seriously, I joined karate and we practiced for two weeks straight, leg ache, body ache because we were made to the The Direction General of service would come, but he didn’t show up. Little things like most of the above stated if revamped will make service year more interesting and easier.

 

Kindly drop your view in the comment box,

 

Temi Badmus

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About TEMI BADMUS

Temi Badmus is a Food scientist and an Art enthusiast. She is an health freelancer, and media Manager. She is a humorous and controversial writer, who believes all form of writing is audible if it's done well. Temi Badmus specializes on indigenous food nutrient research and values. She believes in reaching out to people with health decline through articles and giving advice on good eating habit.

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