NYSC is now charging N4,000 for printing call-up letters to corps members. The money is for infrastructures to be deployed by the collaborating firm. JAMB, WAEC, NECO, Police, Airforce, name it are all into this money spinner and even universities too - everyone is way laying students and job seekers who must pass through their bottlenecks for an opportunity. The applicant pays not just for the examinations, but separately to check the results. In a case I know, up to N3000 is charged per candidate not for the exam, but for scratchcards to check results of the post-UME exams. So, NYSC feels why not become a part of the feeding frenzy. Nigerians are mealy-mouthed people who will always pay up without a protest no matter how silly the thing seems. N4000 for printing a on-page letter makes sense to these people. The level of callousness with which government operators readily milk Nigerians in this regard is galling. Everywhere you go, there are efforts to lay the heaviest burden on defenceless people for the benefit of bureaucrats. At the Immigration, you can never get your Nigerian passport for the official rate. A standard bribe of about N7000 is in-built and I learnt this is shared among Immigration officials from top down. We are talking of institutionalised exploitation of citizens to the tune of billions of naira annually. Why will the policeman in the rain not threaten the motorist who refuses to part with a hundred naira then? The parallel economy of corruption in Nigeria is an insult an an affliction in every. It reveals a callous, hypocritical society where citizens have to survive by brawl and and by violence. To be poor in that kind of an environment is almost like a death sentence.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 09:47:19 +0000