As the digital economy grows to challenges many sectors of the economy, Muhideen, a Nigerian graduate, battles to survive and rescue a generation of Nigerian youth by investing in productivity in technology, a dimension that targets to boost the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), reduce the rate of unemployment, and reduce dependency.
With the advent of cyberspace in financial transactions, which recruited many Nigerian youths for positive and negative lines, particularly the low engagement of northern Nigerian youth in providing digital services for self-reliance, 23-year-old Muhammad Auwal Ahmad, also known as Muhideen, a graduate of computers science from federal university Gashua, established Flow Diary Academy, a well-known Northern Nigerian online educational technology institution that teaches technology in the local language, Hausa, to increase the reliability and positive presence of northern Nigerian youths.
“Understanding the level of dependency, poverty, low productivity, and high rate of unemployment that is at the root of Nigeria’s trials, particularly the befuddling insecurity and extremist group challenges, triggered my innovation to teach digital skills for free and target the Hausa-speaking part of the country for its widespread acceptance in utilising Facebook and other social media handles to promote politics and other negative dealings,” Muhideed told Daily Episod.
According to him, the strike action that was taken by the country’s university lecturers association (ASUU), which lasted for about eight months, rendered Nigerian students hopeless and deepened the idleness of a significant number of students, who only hoped to graduate and be employed in the labour market. This, in turn, made Flowdiary Academy a reality, teaching digital skills during and after the strike to promote positive mind-changing.
However, in the three batches of our training, we have trained 170, 170, and 210 beneficiaries from April to December this year in the following fields: website development, cyber security, application development, graphic design, digital marketing, and WordPress website design.
Although achieving the initiatives has not been easy for us, the positive feedback and rapid growth of both our students and Flowdiary Academy are cause for celebration. We began our lectures on Telegram, and today we launched our website and mobile application where we host the training, which is primarily video with little written content. He added
On examining the activities and outcomes of participating Nigerian youth on social media, data by Statista reveal to Daily Episode that no fewer than 37 million Nigerians engage actively on Facebook, out of about 200 million, approximately populations of the country’s citizens, engaging the population the youth in delivering positive cyberspace service may shape the country’s global presence.
Examining the activities and outcomes of participating Nigerian youth on social media, Statista data reveal to Daily Episode that no fewer than 37 million Nigerians actively engage on Facebook, out of the country’s approximately 200 million citizens. Engaging the youth in delivering positive cyberspace service may shape the country’s global presence.
Engaging the country’s youth in online educational technology institutions or otherwise may be an alternative way of eradicating the menace of cyber security threats, fraudulent activities, and the continuous negative stories of Nigerian citizens who engage in internet fraud, illicit drugs, and other punishable offences.
However, Muhideen’s message of non-support or funding by both state actors and individuals or groups may limit the innovative population of “youth change-makers” who attempt to eradicate poverty and the high rate of unemployment; therefore, their activities require urgent support for the benefit of the country and government efforts at job creation.
According to him, nobody wants to be a criminal because we are all born saints; only extreme poverty and a lack of education, combined with proper home education, can change people. Therefore, both parties must invest in an online educational technology institution or any other related growing industry to save the future of our generation and the next.
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