The Senate has requested President Muhammadu Buhari to direct the Federal Ministry of Labour and Productivity to set up a committee to review the age limit for job seekers in the country.
The move, according to the upper legislative chamber, is to avail competent applicants employment opportunities by the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of government without age barrier.
The Senator representing Sokoto East, Ibrahim Gobir, in a motion at plenary on Wednesday, noted that recruitment requirements of MDAs and other private bodies which set age barriers “inadvertently excludes and marginalises skillful and competent prospective applicants from participating in such exercises.”
According to the lawmaker, “due to the high unemployment rate in the country, many graduates spend up to 10 years seeking employment and this puts them in a disadvantaged position by no fault of theirs.”
Senator Bala Ibn Na’Allah (APC, Kebbi South), drew the attention of the Senate to the Federal government’s embargo on employment over thirteen years ago.
He said: “The period that there has been an embargo by the Federal government in itself should be considered in the review of the age limit.
“For example, if the age limit is 23, we must now add the 13 or 14 years of embargo on employment to the age already earmarked for employment, so that the age will be plus thirteen, because it is the government on its own that placed the embargo on employment.
“There cannot be justification for you to place embargo on employment, then at the same time expect graduates to remain at the age they were during the period of the embargo. “I think in the review, that has to be taken into account, and therefore, the age limit can now be raised in addition to the established age. That should be the legal verdict for the review.”
On his part, the Senate president, Dr. Ahmad Lawan, bemoaned the discrimination against job seekers as a result of the barrier imposed by the prescribed age limit. He said: “It is not through a fault of theirs that people are discriminated against. They’ll tell you only the 30 years limit, meanwhile someone graduated ten years ago.
“This is a very good motion urging the Ministry of Labour and Productivity to swing into action immediately,” Lawan said.