Safety Or Service? Rethinking The NYSC

This week, families of prospective National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members have been thrown into panic after gunmen reportedly attacked two buses travelling from Ibadan to orientation camps in Abia and Akwa Ibom. Several corps members were abducted, with reports that the kidnappers demanded N50 million ransom for each victim.
It is not an isolated incident. In August, 15 corps members travelling from the NYSC orientation camp in Bayelsa State towards Abuja were reportedly abducted in Kogi State. Eleven were subsequently rescued. These incidents should force us to ask a question that Nigeria has avoided for too long: at what point does national service become an unacceptable national...