How Unemployment is Costing Kenya its Security

Kenya is plagued by many ills including unemployment, which is a major cause of crime in the country, especially among the youth. According to The World Bank’s Economic Overview of Kenya for May 2013, youth unemployment is among the critical development challenges facing Kenya.

Unemployment affects a young person’s life in various ways;

• There is a thin line between unemployment and crime, violence, drug use and depression.
• The burden of finding a job goes far beyond a young person’s individual livelihood. Often, an entire extended family has pinned their hopes of financial support on one young member with the potential to succeed in school. When this young person graduates from university yet fails to find employment, the livelihood of the entire family is at risk not to mention the stress, humiliation and guilt the young person must bear.
• Some youth witness generations of unemployment (grandparents, parents and siblings, all unable to sustain employment) and feel a sense of hopelessness about not being able to break out of the unemployment trap.

Most of the unemployed youths in the country are not only skilled but also highly educated. Research done in 2010 showed that about 750,000 youths graduate from tertiary institutions in Kenya while only 250,000 are absorbed into the job market every year. This explains the high yet rapidly rising youth unemployment rate.

In the past few years, Kenya has been under major threat from the terrorist group Al-Shabaab, whose members are responsible for the Westgate killings three years ago and the 2015 attack at a local university that left approximately 147 people dead, among other threats. Knowing the desperation of job seeking in Kenya, especially among the young people, this terror group has taken advantage to trick youths into joining the group. Case in point, the Daily Nation newspaper published an article last year about a former teacher and later a boat engine repairer who, on the quest for a better life, became a victim of this trap. This man who requested his identity to be withheld was promised a job in Qatar only to find himself in an unknown place and officially recruited as an Al-Shabaab fighter, although he managed to escape some years down the line, he had already taken part in 10 missions. The man also said in the interview that, there are many Kenyans fighting for the Al-Shabaab in Somalia.

Youth with special skills from Universities and colleges are susceptible for recruitment into the illegal killer group if they fail to secure proper jobs.

It is now clear that the unemployment rate in this country is costing Kenya’s security a lot; it is helpless to fight terrorism if we are not able to prevent our young generation from falling for the temptation of getting easy money. Unemployment not only leads to terrorism but also affects our small towns where crime is growing. Maybe instead of sending thousands of our soldiers to war the government should focus more on reducing unemployment.