Question: “What is your comment on the debate about whether Nigerian graduates are still great, as discussed on the Platform?”
My Response: I do not subscribe to the thesis that Nigerian graduates are not great. Rather, I posit that Nigerian graduates are not given sufficient opportunities to develop rapidly after school. A typical Nigerian graduate is just as capable as anyone globally; the challenge is that our systems often fail them by not creating pathways to scale their capabilities.
This debate is not new. In virtually every Nigerian university, graduates from one generation tend to believe that those who came after them were less prepared. But if we look deeper, we will realize something important: young people today are smarter, more exposed, and often more adaptable. The real issue is not raw capability; it is the absence of accelerated development opportunities.
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When I was in FUTO, I knew nothing about “pitch deck”. Today, many FUTO graduates can prepare investor presentations, understand startup ecosystems, and navigate tools we never imagined. The difference is exposure. But unlike my time, when many strong students graduated on Friday and resumed work on Monday, today’s graduates may spend months, or even years, waiting for opportunities. That delay creates a developmental gap. So, the issue is not the students. The issue is the system.
At the same time, we must recognize that far more people are competing for limited opportunities today. In the 1950s or 1960s, a village might have sponsored only 5 boys to attend secondary school while others remained at home. The system had already filtered for the top 1%. Today, education is more democratized, and many more people have access. Some interpret this expansion as declining quality. I disagree.
This is also why I dislike comparisons between new African immigrants in America and the broader first generation Africans in United States. Some people wrongly assume the immigrants are inherently smarter or more capable. I say: not really. The immigration system itself is a filter. By the time the U.S. embassy issues visas, it has often selected from the top tier, perhaps the top 10%, of those applying. You cannot compare that filtered group to the entire first-generation population Africans in America. If you applied the same filter locally, you would discover the same caliber of people.
The real issue, therefore, is not whether Nigeria has talent. Nigeria has immense talent. The real issue is that too many organizations are not investing in developing young people. Our young people are victims of weak systems, not evidence of weak capacity.
If we provide the right support, mentorship, and opportunities, Nigerian graduates can build and power world-class systems. The capability exists. What is required is the ecosystem to unlock it.
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