Some days ago I was listening to Lagos FM radio and heard somebody on the talk show lamenting why there is so much discrimination here. In particular he lampooned employers who would prefer to employ somebody with a foreign degree to somebody who studied in Nigeria and has the same degree. The person with a foreign degree most times has also had a stint working abroad or serving his articleship.
Having lived in Nigeria most of my life and having lived and worked abroad for nine years if I was an employer I would do the same. We say we work in Nigeria but we don’t, really. Even though lateness is common, even where a worker in Nigeria reports for work at the stipulated time much of the working day is wasted on frivolity. Probably close to half of the working day is wasted on matters unrelated to the work he is being paid for. Apart from personal acts of indiscipline there is what I may call the Nigerian factor. One of the ways staff waste employers’ time is on frivolous phone calls both incoming and calls made by the staff himself. He obviously has not imbibed the full meaning of the white man’s saying, ‘time is money’. The time wasted talking on phone is costing the employer money.
Staff apply for time to go and bury their grandmother or father hoping that the employer has no records showing that he buried that relative three or four years previously. Relatives or friends drop in for a chat in the office and these chats last for as long as thirty minutes! Employees also go on their private business or errands during office hours thus cheating their employers.
Put this side by side with the attitude of employees in the United States of America. It is usually forbidden for staff to make or take private calls during office hours. And this rule is strictly obeyed. Any flouting of this rule is punished by deduction of pay or even termination of appointment. Staff do not welcome visitors to their offices or leave the office anyhow. Staff do not attend to private matters or business in the office. Workers must give their employers every minute of the time they are supposed to be working for them. Staff have to work hard for every dollar they are paid. To make ends meet some staff even have to keep two jobs!
In the USA you can have all the things that make for a good life including buying furniture, clothing, telephone and virtually anything on credit but at month end you find that you have nothing because creditors have collected their debt. And defaults are punished instantly. If you cannot pay for furniture that you bought on credit the repossession outfits are prompt in recovering the furniture.
There is clearly wide discrepancy between work in Europe and America and work in Nigeria. The difference is attitude. Workers need to put in an honest day’s work for their employers and at the end of the month be satisfied that they have earned their wages. Until then the worker with a foreign degree especially if he has had working experience abroad will always be preferred to the worker who has worked all his life in Nigeria.