Meet Emmanuel Soroba, The Brain Behind the Unemployment Solution in Kenya

According to a report released by World Bank, 25.5 million youth in Kenya are unemployed. The report goes on to say that the majority of these youth live in abject poverty despite having the necessary skills to face the labor market.

The unemployment menace in Kenya has been on for a long time, spanning decades. By March last year, the unemployment rate in Kenya was three times more than that of Tanzania. For instance, one in every six Kenyans (youth) is unemployed. In Tanzania, it is estimated that one in every 30 Tanzanians (youth) is unemployed.

Coupled with numerous massive corruption both in the private and public sector, unemployment in Kenya is increasingly becoming a real challenge. The Kenyan youth is becoming desperate with each coming day. Some have opted to venture into crime and some have even attempted joining the terror group, Alshabaab all in an effort of looking for greener pastures.

One young man, though, is out to make sure he touches as many youths as possible in terms of job creation as well as making them discover ways of making their skills to earn a living for them.

Mr. Soroba has a wide experience in the hospitality sector and has spent quite some time abroad. It is through travelling around the world that the young entrepreneur discovered that the world was full of young people who have the skills and dreams to better their future including being employers but they just did not know how.

And as they say that charity begins at home, Soroba came back home to help in liberating his own people at home (the Kenyan youth).

“I decided to be the solution and not joining the bandwagon of those who just constantly complain about a problem,” he says.

He says, in reaching as many youths as possible, an idea of creating an online marketplace was born. He decided to come up with FiveSok. FiveSok helps young people display their skills ranging from the price of 500 shillings to 5000 shillings for buyers to find them.

“It is a platform that connects experts to buyers of their skills for small scale tasks such as graphic design. The tasks are affordable ranging from 500 shillings to 5000 shillings,” he added.

Unlike other platforms, FiveSok takes only 15% commission of every task that is done and successfully completed. The buyer doesn’t have to worry about the safety of his money, “the buyer does not pay direct to the expert. He or she makes the payments through us. We then hold the money until the work is completed and the buyer is satisfied. It is only until then that we release the funds,” he explains.