The All Progressives Congress, which defeated the then ruling Peoples Democratic Party in the March 28 presidential election, had promised during its campaign that if elected to the central government, it would pay N5,000 monthly to 25 million jobless youths as well as introduce a free school feeding programme.
A motion to compel the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to fulfil the campaign promise of paying the unemployed youths was recently rejected in the Senate.
Our correspondents learnt on Monday that the Federal Government had, however, commenced plans to start the payment of the allowance while it had also taken steps to capture the free school feeding programme in the 2016 budget.
It was further learnt that the government had saddled some officials with the task of ascertaining the number of the unemployed youths, who would benefit from the scheme.
A top government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity on Monday, told one of our correspondents that the compilation of data was necessary in order to ensure that the programme was not sabotaged.
The source said, “You know that if the scheme is left open-ended, even Nigerians, who are employed and are by no means vulnerable, will still struggle to benefit from it.
“You also know that if not properly handled, politicians will hijack the scheme and it will become a means of settling their constituents, whether they qualify to benefit from it or not.
This is why the government will come up with data on the beneficiaries very soon.”
The source added that the fund meant for the scheme would be built into the 2016 budget.
He explained that it was only when a decision had been reached on the number of people that would benefit from the scheme that the government would have an idea of how much it would spend on the programme.
He agreed that as a result of the process to get ready the 2016 budget and passed it into law, the scheme might not take off either in January or February, 2016.
The Senior Special Assistant to the Vice-President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Laolu Akande, confirmed that work was ongoing on the identification of beneficiaries, saying it was the desire of government to ensure the commencement of the programme in 2016.
Akande stated, “Work is ongoing on various aspects of the implementation of that social investment plan, including the identification of those that will benefit from it. Very soon, we shall be concluding work on that; that is a very important aspect of the programme.
“The plan of the government is to start as much as possible in the area of social investment, and conditional cash transfer is part of it.
“It is the plan of the government to explore how to start this with the 2016 budget.”
According to analysis, the cash transfer programme, when fully implemented, will cost the Federal Government N125bn monthly and a total sum of N1.5tr annually.
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