On Thursday, the National Youth Service Corps threatened harsh penalties against schools or officials found aiding and abetting the false mobilisation of corps members for national service.
The agency stated that the punishments would include blacklisting schools that had been found guilty of breaches in the previous three years.
Major General Shuaibu Ibrahim, the Director-General of NYSC, revealed this during the opening ceremony of the 2022 Batch ‘A’ pre-mobilisation workshop in Abuja, with the topic, ‘Enhancing the credibility of the mobilisation process through effective data control.’
“As you are all aware, data generated from corps-producing institutions is the raw material processed for mobilisation,” he stated.
“Let me tell the public, however, that we are not lowering our guard as we continue to evolve and improve.”
“This record is supposed to be pure and undiluted, but for selfish motives of some players along the production chain, we have continued to encounter challenges.
“Let me, however, assure the public that we are not letting down our guard as we have continued to evolve and enhance control measures, including those that are technology-driven. These efforts require the buy-in of other relevant stakeholders, including student affairs officers.
“Since coming on board in 2019, we have been having meetings with corps-producing institutions, especially the student affairs officers, so that our mobilisation process will not be compromised.
“We also introduced indemnity requiring the head of institutions to endorse whatever data are forwarded to the NYSC, so that if there is any infraction, the scheme can apply sanctions. That is what we have been doing. We have blacklisted institutions guilty of such infractions.”