Fresh graduates face bleak future as Banks contract staff surge

As more fresh Nigerian graduates face a bleak future, especially those seeking a future in banking, an average graduate will need to be exceptionally good to get a non-contract job in the banking sector.

In the latest banking sector report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), contract staff across Nigerian banks hit a record 46,263 in June 2019.

According to the Bureau’s report, contract staff in banks rose by 6% from 43,955 in June 2018 to 46,263 in June 2019. This means in the last one year, contract staff rose by 2,308 across all banks.

As of June 2019, Contract staff recorded the highest number with 46,263 staff or 44.3% of the total staff across Nigerian banks.

Others include junior staff (39,980 or 38.3%), Senior Staff (17,943 or 17.19%) and Executive Staff (178 or 0.17%).

Further analysis shows that Bank staff dropped from 105,017 in March to 104,364 in June 2019. This means bank staff dropped by 653, and this may be traceable to retirements, resignation and possible restructuring exercises.

A closer look shows that the biggest drop was recorded in the senior staff category, followed by junior and the executive staff.

It is also instructive to note that despite the drop across all categories, contract staff still recorded a slight rise. In June 2019, only contract staff categories recorded an increase while others dropped.

This implies that Nigerian banks are increasingly depending on contract staff to perform daily operations. Just as earlier stated, contract staff rose by 128.6% between 2017 and 2019. This point to the fact that banks are changing their recruitment policy to favour more of contract employees who are predominantly young graduates.

Experts have opined that it costs banks less to employ contract casual staff while the process of retrenching them is also easy, therefore, contract staffing has become a preferred recruitment option for banks.

Also, the evolution of technology has been noted to have contributed to the rising trend. Specifically, industry experts have argued that the increasing aid of computer programmes and applications, have made bank jobs turn very routine and requiring less skill.

Hence, since semi-skilled jobs often attract low wages, banks see this as an area of cost savings.

This also has negative consequences on youth migration out of Nigerian. Hundreds of thousands of Nigerians are seeking a better life in countries like Canada and the United States as quality jobs become fewer.

As rightly noted that the youthful population of Nigeria forms its biggest strength to economic prosperity, this means as more Nigerian graduates seek greener pasture in other countries, this may constitute future brain drain in the economy.