I Want to Serve Nigeria. But Do I Have to Risk My Life to Get There? - by 𝑫'𝒙𝑪𝑬𝑳𝑳𝑬𝑵𝑻 ™ ✍️🥇

I have been thinking about NYSC lately.Not the “Allawee.”Not even the excitement of finally leaving school and saying, “I have graduated.” I mean the journey.Because sometimes I genuinely ask myself: Is it still reasonable to send a young person across the country for national service when travelling itself has become a security concern? I live in Ilorin.Imagine I get posted to Abuja.I have to leave Ilorin, enter a vehicle, travel through different roads, pass through different states, and just hope everything goes well until I arrive. And this is not me saying Abuja is dangerous.That's not the point.The point is the journey itself. Just recently, prospective NYSC members travelling from Ibadan to their orientation camps in Abia and Akwa Ibom were attacked in Imo State. Some were rescued, while others remained in captivity as their families desperately waited for them to return. This isn't even the first time we have heard about corps members being caught up in kidnapping incidents. At some point, you stop asking, “Where am I posted?” You start asking:“How am I going to get there?” And that is where my problem with the current NYSC system begins. I understand the original idea.Send young Nigerians to different parts of the country.Let someone from the South experience the North.Let someone from the West experience the East. Meet people from different backgrounds.Learn about different cultures.Build national unity.Beautiful idea. But Nigeria today is not exactly the Nigeria that existed when this system was created.Our security reality has changed. So shouldn't some parts of the system change too?If I want to serve Nigeria in Lagos, why can't Lagos be my choice? If I live in Ilorin and want to serve in Kwara, why should that automatically be considered less “national” than sending me hundreds of kilometres away? Does national integration only happen when we physically move young people across dangerous roads? Can't we still promote national unity while giving people more options? Maybe let people choose a preferred state.Maybe prioritise their state of residence or nearby states. Maybe allow people to choose within their geopolitical zone.And where there is a serious security concern, don't send them there simply because a computer generated the posting. Because let's be honest.I want to serve Nigeria.I don't have a problem with serving.I have a problem with the idea that serving Nigeria must come with unnecessary risk. Even NYSC itself has issued travel advisories telling prospective corps members to avoid night journeys, use registered transport companies, share their locations with family members and take safety precautions. The NYSC Director-General has also acknowledged the security challenge and said corps members are sometimes escorted by security personnel on certain routes. And I'm not saying NYSC doesn't care. I'm asking whether the system itself needs to be redesigned around the Nigeria we have today. Because if the biggest advice before national service is: Don't travel at night.Tell your family where you are. Be careful on the road.Know the dangerous areas.Keep your phone charged.Know where you can seek safety. Then maybe we should also be asking a bigger question:Why are we still designing national service as if movement across the country carries the same risk it did before? I don't think the answer has to be “cancel NYSC.”Maybe the answer is reform it. Make safety a bigger part of deployment.Give graduates more choice. Reduce unnecessary long-distance movement. And where security conditions make a posting unreasonable, let safety come before the traditional idea of “national integration.” Because at the end of the day... A country cannot be asking its young people to build the nation while failing to make sure they can safely reach the places where they are being sent to build it. I want to wear that khaki.I want to serve.I want to meet people from other parts of Nigeria.I want the experience.But I also want to come back home and tell my parents: “I served Nigeria.”Not:“I was lucky to make it there.” Thank you. Note: This is just my own opinion ohh, you can share your own too in the comments.

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