Presidency justifies N500b investment in social services

By Ali Smart

The Presidency has justified the inclusion of over N500 billion investments on social services in the 2016 budget, saying it was informed by the need to positively affect the lives of underprivileged Nigerians.

This was stated in a statement on Sunday by the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity in the office of the Vice President, Mr Laolu Akande, adding that at no time in the nation’s budgetary history has the federal government made a specific vote of such volume for social welfare.

Describing the vote as novel, the statement said: “Even economic historians now say that not only is the half a trillion Naira vote unprecedented, but it is also the greatest service ever done to the Nigerian state and people by any federal government administration.”

The President’s vision, Akande emphasised, “Is to increase investments in human capital to guarantee security for all, employment and improved well-being of the people.”

He disclosed that the presidency is aware that past attempts to address poverty has suffered because of insufficient political will, presence of various UN-coordinated initiatives and poorly targeted beneficiaries among other factors, and is working to avoid the pitfalls.

The Vice President’s aide said for the Conditional Cash Transfer, CCT, where one million extremely poor Nigerians will receive N5000 monthly in 2016, the money would be paid directly to the beneficiaries through a payment system that is being worked out.
He also hinted that the World Bank and the Bill Gates Foundation are collaborating with the presidency to develop an efficient payment system.

“All together, about N60B has been estimated to be paid out to extremely poor Nigerians. And the implementation of the programme starts once the budget is passed.”

Akande further disclosed that there would also be direct payment in the Homegrown School Feeding Programme.

“In the case of the CCT, those one million poor Nigerians would be paid directly, while in the case of the Homegrown School Feeding, the suppliers of the meals to the primary school pupils would also be paid directly by the federal government. There would be no middle agents involved, official or private,” he said.

According to him, the federal government will start a pilot scheme in selected states once the budget is passed for the Home Grown School Feeding Program.

The one-meal-a-day programme is also being supported by the Imperial College in the UK through one of its agencies, Partnership for Child Development, PCD.

According to Akande, the Homegrown School Feeding will not only feed the children and help their learning significantly, but it would also boost the local economy of the states and the local communities.

The Buhari presidency has four other social investment plans, including the 500,000 direct jobs, where unemployed graduates would be trained and hired to become volunteer teachers in their communities while looking for jobs in their chosen profession.

There is also a Youth Employment plan that would take 370,000 non-graduates youths through skills acquisition and vocational training programmes. Like the teaching jobs, the selection of beneficiaries for this scheme would be done on states and FCT basis and opened to all Nigerians of different shades.
For small scale traders, artisans and market women, there is the Micro Credit scheme where one million Nigerians would get a one-time soft loan of N60,000 each through the Bank of Industry.

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