The increasing crime rate across Nigeria is basically orchestrated and fuelled by idleness. Since youths are mostly fingered as harbingers of the criminality pervading the land, one of the veritable ways of discouraging the trend is supporting Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) initiatives.
With this put in place, David Eno Samson, an orphan and a “small chops” baker, believes youths idling away and readily available for violent protest and other forms of criminality will subside.
Sighted at one of the University of Uyo campuses sitting beside his show glass of “small chops” and beckoning customers for patronage, David obliged to speak on how he’s been weathering the storm of the current economic debacle in the country.
“My name is David Eno Samson from Uyo Local Government Area. I’m an orphan living with my grandparents in my family house in this Uyo.
“My grandparents sell periwinkles and that is what we are using to sustain ourselves. Ibake and also make pastries for sale.
“I finished secondary in 2015. I am 26 years old. After secondary school, I joined one of my friends where he was doing a sales boy job in a supermarket in Uyo.
“After staying there for some years, I decided to learn how to make “small chops.” I learnt the skill for three months before I started making and selling for myself. I started with the sum of N100,000,” he narrated.
David’s roadside business was hitherto profitable until inflation set in via the removal of fuel subsidy and subsequent increase in transportation fares and high cost of raw materials.
He speaks further: “Some of the challenges I’m facing is the high cost of buying ingredients. There is really not much profit in this business, but I’m doing it because I don’t want to stay idle.
“Since I started, I spend, at least, N24,000 on just flour daily in making small chops that I bring to the campus and by the end of the day, what I realize from it as my profit is less than N3, 000.
“This is because of the high cost of baking materials in the market. I don’t want to tell you how expensive sugar, milk and eggs are, but they are so expensive!
“If I make N25,000 sales in a day, sometimes my profit is just N1, 000 and I will have to put the rest of the money back into the business.
“If I don’t do it like that, I might fall out of business, and I really don’t want to stay idle.
“Most times, because of how little the money I’m making is, I find it hard to feed, so I often go on snacks since that is what I sell.
“Since I didn’t attend university, I want to work hard. Though I still have the dream of going back to school that is why I’m trying to do everything I can. If everything goes well, I have a dream of becoming a medical doctor.
“Criminality isn’t an option. I know some young guys at Uyo Plaza that are into pickpocketing and other vices to get by the hard economy facing everyone in the country, but I can’t steal, that is why I’m doing the little I can do for myself.
“I want to plead with the government to support young entrepreneurs like me. It’s not easy.
“If they can help half of the young entrepreneurs that are struggling in this country, it would ease the crime rate and add to the economy.
“The reason there is a high crime rate across this country is because most youths are idle. Not that they don’t want to do anything, but there is no money to start up something.
“If you do a sales boy for someone, the highest you can get is N15,000 monthly.
“How much are you going to feed with especially with the high cost of foodstuffs and then save up to start a business of your own?
“Most of us that couldn’t go to the university are at a big disadvantage because, we don’t even have the hope of getting a better job.
“That’s why in Uyo you see that most of the young guys that are not stealing, are selling kpomo (cow skin). Even though the profit is little, they still do because if they don’t, they would starve.
“So, the government should help us by sponsoring our small scale businesses. If they do this, it will encourage other youths to get serious and hustle rather than resorting to criminality.”
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