Gulu University Vice Chancellor, Professor George Openjuru Ladaah, has described unemployment in Uganda as unjustified, noting that the country still has numerous opportunities, including in waste management and undertaking.
”The unemployment in Uganda is unjustified, but maybe it is justified because, as Universities, we are training useless people who cannot think for themselves, which is very unfortunate, and we are trying to change the curriculum to ensure that we create critical thinking in the graduates that we are going to produce.” He noted.
Prof Openjuru pointed out that there is still so much to do in Uganda’s economy, saying that the country is not at maturity, and that there should be no unemployment.
”Even people who are dying are another opportunity for jobs: the funeral service, the person who started the Uganda Funeral Services; they laughed, they despised, but now undertaking is a very good business.”
Adding that; ”Grave digging, the people used to despise it ten years ago; now nobody can bury without those people. Actually, if you bury with ropes, then you know you are poor.”
Prof Openjuru cited that the country is lacking critical thinkers, with students looking at being employed rather than focusing on tapping opportunities.
”This is not the era of jobs; this is the era of extending the economy. At some point, when we were still in Makerere (University), I said, ‘The garbage piling up, that is a job, people laughed. But I’m telling you, the student who took up that is now a tycoon, a major tycoon in Kampala in terms of garbage collection, and that market is flooded.”
Explaining that, ”There is so much to do in the Ugandan economy; we are not yet at maturity, that there should actually be nobody who is unemployed.”
According to Prof Openjuru, Uganda’s employment opportunities also dwell in agriculture, which he says has numerous chains.
”And as a farming nation, and we are a farming university, none of our students should be unemployed because agriculture trains the farmers directly; the business people are supposed to train the people who should sell the produce; the scientists should ensure that the products are managed properly, ensuring that there is no production contamination in the market.” He noted.
”The lawyers should ensure that the land; we do not spend a lot of time quarrelling over land, but we still spend a lot of time quarrelling over. Institute of peace should ensure that there is peace; medicine should ensure health.” Prof Openjuru added.
Prof Openjuru instead advised graduates, who he described as people who have got the wrong degree, to come back (to the University) for another so that they can engage with the Ugandan economy differently.
”So those of you who have got the wrong degree and have not opened your heads, come back for another degree. From next year, we are going to start training you differently to open your head so that you can engage with the Ugandan economy differently.”
Shift in training
Prof Openjuru admitted that institutions of higher learning have been training people differently and called for a shift, saying;
”We have been training people differently with the expectation that there are a lot of jobs; now we have learned from secondary schools that there are actually no jobs.”
So the kind of people we want are not people who should fill up the jobs that started during the colonial time; we now want people who will invest in the economy and create productivity. He added.
Competency-based learning
He explained that competency-based teaching will address some of the country`s unemployment problem, with students trained to identify gaps smartly and enhance production.
”The reason we are going competency is that we do not want our graduates, and this is another point. Our students should be able to see gaps in the industry and fill up that gap smartly in order to enhance production. In other words, they should not go out to look for who can employ me; they should look for where can I add value, and where you add value is just endless. The pineapple waste in Luweero is where value can be added.”
Professor Openjuru disclosed that he is overwhelmed by the requests for employment from graduands.
”Every day I get irritated, inundated, flooded by requests for jobs; every meter I walk, somebody is stopping me for jobs, like I am a recruitment firm. It really annoys me; I can tell you as I walked here, somebody was sitting in my car pleading for jobs, and then I get irritated because I say jobs are everywhere if you can only open your eyes a little and put your heart a little more.”
Using an anecdote, Professor Openjuru explained that everyone who consumes must be able to produce, noting that those who do not know where to produce are very useless and must ask God to take them away.
”If everybody eats, everybody should produce value.” He stated.
Alluding to an anecdote: ”I like this Ekanya. Ekanya went to the bar and said, ‘Everybody, have a beer, and then everybody had a beer. Then Ekanya paid for one bottle, and they said, but you ordered so many bottles. They were dreaming.
No, if you consume, you must produce; whose products do you want to eat when yours are not there?
So when I say everybody has a beer, it means everybody buys a beer; and then the world is even. So if you want to eat, what do you do? You produce.”
”If you don’t know where to produce, please ask God to take you away, because you are a very useless product. And it is even more painful when Collins (Dean of Agriculture) has trained you at Gulu University. We expect your productivity and your ingenuity to be larger, then you come back to the VC to ask for a job?”
He described people without jobs as those unable to think outside the box. ”Some of those people irritate me. I have known, I have been in the Gulu University, people who stayed without jobs; that means people who are not able to see.”
The professor explained the value chain in Uganda.
…………So as agriculturalists, the land, which is a factor of production, is really available; look for it, even if it means hiring, hire them.
Entrepreneurship has a higher labour requirement is already there. You have been trained; you have the knowledge.
Why don’t you put those things together in order to engage yourself meaningfully and eat meaningfully, because when you eat meaninglessly, it means you eat when you don’t produce? Let that be for children; babies are the ones who are supposed to eat and play. We are supposed to eat and work.
Now, capital: you can get capital; even one hoe is capital; banks are chasing after people to give money; if you are serious, banks queue up to give money; you can get the money.
Professor Openjuru also blamed the abuse of students on placement, saying that they are reduced to mere office messengers and receptionists instead of being trained on practical skills.
Internships
”My experience of internship (other students’ placement) arrangements is that they make our students office messengers; we don’t teach them to be office messengers in an agriculture farm (firm), we don’t teach them to be waiters, we don’t teach them to be receptionists, we teach them to do executive work in the agricultural production process.”
So you will help us to let those firms know how to deploy our students, and how to also let those students learn and take the records of the students and give it to us, as part of the assessment of the students. He added.
Professor Openjuru made the remarks from Gulu City on Wednesday while signing a Memorandum of Understanding between Gulu University and Epiflex Agrovet Solutions Limited for students’ training, internship, industrial attachment, community outreach, and extension services, development validation and commercialisation, and capacity building and knowledge exchange.
The collaboration includes promoting applied research in Agriculture, veterinary services, and implementing students’ internships.