By Chol D. Johnson
A young canoe producer in Bor town has urged South Sudanese youth to not rely on white-collar jobs and instead embrace small-scale businesses that can sustain them and contribute to national development.
Speaking live on social media from his workplace in Bor on Friday, Nyuon Manyok Alier, a Senior Four certificate holder, said youth should stop depending on relatives or uncles for employment in government or NGOs.
“I’m encouraging youth to create jobs and not seek white-collar jobs,” Manyok said.
“Interdependence on uncles’ jobs is not professional job creation. It is an abuse of professionalism. Try to create business and employ others,” he added.
Manyok, who completed secondary school without financial support to pursue university, started his canoe-making business in 2024 at Leudiet dock along the River Nile in Bor.
Together with colleagues, he produces canoes used by fishermen, exchanging them for money. He explained that his decision to join business rather than higher education was driven by the country’s economic situation.
He stressed that youth should not blame elders for the state of the nation but instead join hands to fight economic hardship through innovation and entrepreneurship. “We have to do what we can afford as youth to fight the economic situation by creating job opportunities,” he said.
He added that hard work and sweat yield more fruitful income than relying on others.
Manyok also appealed to the government to create job opportunities to empower youth, warning that unemployment fuels crime and insecurity.
“Once the youth are busy working, there will be no gangs or peer groups cutting people with pangas and committing robbery,” he said.
He further encouraged jobless youth in urban centers such as Juba to venture into agriculture and fishing in rural areas.
Despite challenges such as competition from producers in Mangala and high transportation costs for timber from Juba to Bor, Manyok said Bor remains strategic because most customers are fishermen from northern Jonglei.