Labour Market Demand And University Graduate Employability Skills
[A CASE STUDY OF NORTH-WEST NIGERIA]

This situation pervades mostly developing nations of the world, especially African nations. Pauw, Ooshizen and Westhuizen (2007) discovered in South Africa that many graduates lack soft skills, workplace readiness and experience. Boateng and Ofori-Sarpong (2002) also noted that in Ghana employers of labour referred to recent graduates as those who lack basic skills to complete simple routine assignments and this gave the impression that certification is a mere formality rather than an indication of achievement. The situation is not different in Nigeria as employers of labour believed that graduates are poorly trained and unproductive on the job. Nigerian graduates have been described variously as half-baked, ill-equipped, ill-trained, of poor quality, of a poor standard and unemployable (Obayan, 2002). This explained why university education in Nigeria has not been able to fulfil its mandate of producing high-level manpower needed for national development in required quality that can fit and compete favourably both at national and international labour market.
    However, the current thinking is that university education should develop in the beneficiary a certain number of generic skills to a level that will ensure the continued creative productivity of the individual. These skills, according to Obayan (2002), include:
i.    analytical power: this comprises an advanced capacity for logical reasoning, employing appropriate verbal, quantitative, graphic, documentary, audio-visual, sensory perceptions and a wide variety of tools.
ii.    Communication: this includes oral and written as well (as in other possible forms) using the appropriate language and non-verbal form in specific situations to achieve specific objectives.
iii.    problem-solving: this is the ability to task one’s analytical power to the maximum in developing possible solution paths to the problem in a variety of situations.
iv.    Team spirit: is the ability to contribute meaningfully to group activities in a wide variety of forms to relate with others to get out of one’s shell while remaining oneself.
V. creativity: refers to the ability to go beyond the well-trodden path in thinking as well as in action.
vi.    life-long learning skills; include perseverance, risk taking, a spirit of enquiry, reading as a habit, self-directed learning efforts, the activity to face challenges and so on (p. 4).
    In today’s labour market, employers of labour attach much importance to graduate employability which refers to work readiness, that is, possession of the skills, knowledge, attitudes and commercial understanding that will enable new graduates to make productive contributions to organisational objectives soon after commencing work (Mason, 2001). Although, the Federal Government of Nigeria, in conjunction with some agencies, at one time or another, have introduced some palliative measures to address this challenge of unemployment by organizing different programmes like National Directorate of Employment (NDE) that was launched in 1986 with the mandate of designing programmes that will promote attitudinal change, employment generation, poverty reduction and wealth creation; and National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) was also launched in 2001 to address poverty and related issues.