EMPOWERING THE READIED LABOUR ARMIES: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND THE CHALLENGES OF UNEMPLOYMENT AND POVETY IN NIGERIA

Abstract

Abstract The Nigerian paradox has continued to baffle the world because of the poverty level in the country contradicts the country‟s immense wealth as over 70 per cent of her citizens ‟s wallow in absolute poverty without jobs, food, clothing or shelter. Successive regimes in Nigeria have embarked on several growth and development programmes to ameliorate these challenges since independence. These growths and development policies have failed to achieve her various core mandates. The evidence of their failures is an obvious manifestation of the increasing rate of poverty and massive rate of unemployment in the country; in an era that information technology is offering information and knowledge that are critical component for poverty alleviation/eradication and employment generation. This paper assessed information technology and the unending challenges of unemployment and poverty in Nigeria; this objective was accomplished through the utilization of secondary sources of data, sourced mainly from journals both national and international, useful textbooks, government official gazettes among others. The paper is strictly exploratory research analyzed from the theoretical the platform of system theory. The study found that the Nigerian government‟s inability to identify and invest in appropriate sectors critical for tackling any form of development challenges today; backed up by a lack of effective and efficient policies along this spectrum, among others, are the major issues contending against the various efforts put in place to overcome these hydra-heated challenges of unemployment and poverty in Nigeria. It is therefore the conclusion of this paper that, information technology is the most important tool that derives today‟s global economy. Nigerian government should therefore invest in this sector that presents several potentials and strengths of creating millions of job opportunities for our ever-increasing readied labour armies of unemployed and poor population.