JSPES, Vol. 40, No. 3 (Fall 2015)
pp. 263–288

Youth Unemployment and Armed Insurrection in Post-Military Nigeria: The Contending Issues

Dele Babalola

University of Kent, Canterbury, United Kingdom

Caleb Ayuba
Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution (IPCR), Abuja, Nigeria

This article provides an overview of the internal conflicts within Nigeria, doing so primarily through explaining the role of Nigeria’s youth in either igniting or sustaining the types of insurgency that have plagued the country in the post-military era. In pursuing this, the paper focuses on the activities of the Niger Delta militants, which dominated the start of the current democratic dispensation, and those of the Boko Haram insurgents in the north. The paper suggests socio-economic empowerment of the youths as an antidote to youth unemployment, and, by extension, as a way to avert future armed insurrection and other forms of violent conflicts that have become synonymous with Nigerian youths.