The Federal Government, on Monday says it has commenced the payment of N5,000 monthly stipend to one million vulnerable Nigerians.
The announcement was made in a statement signed by the spokesperson to the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, Laolu Akande on Monday.
The statement disclosed that the government commenced the payment through the Conditional Cash Transfer, CCT, of its government’s Social Investment Programmes, SIP.
The Federal Government said under the CCT, one million Nigerians would receive N5,000 monthly payments.
Akande stated that the payment was a form of social safety net for the poorest and most vulnerable as budgeted for in the 2016 Budget.
According to the Vice President’s spokesperson, some of the beneficiaries have received their first payments in the first batch that commenced last week.
He said, “In the first batch that commenced last week, nine states would be covered, and many of the beneficiaries have already reported receiving their first payments by Friday last week, December 30, 2016.
“Funds for the commencement of the payments in four states were released last week to the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) – the platform that hosts and validates payments for all government’s social intervention programmes. Funds for another set of five states to complete the first batch of nine states would follow soon.”
He listed some of the states that have commenced the payment to include, Borno, Kwara, Bauchi, Cross Rivers, Niger, Kogi, Oyo, Ogun and Ekiti state.
Akande explained that the above states were selected because they had a social register that identified the vulnerable and poorest Nigerians.
He said, “Though the sequence for the payment of the money would be operationally managed by NIBSS, beneficiaries in Borno, Kwara and Bauchi States have started receiving the money. The other states in the first batch to commence the CCT payments are Cross Rivers, Niger, Kogi, Oyo, Ogun & Ekiti States.
“The nine pilot states were chosen because they have an existing Social Register that successfully identified the most vulnerable and poorest Nigerians through a tried and tested community based targeting (CBT) method working with the World Bank. However other states have already begun developing their Social Registers and would be included in subsequent phases of the CCT implementation.”
The Federal Government said with the support of the World Bank, it adopted the CBT for developing the social register in the other states across the country for transparency, objectivity and credibility in the selection of the poorest and vulnerable Nigerians.
He disclosed that government would soon commence community mobilisation for the creation of the register in more states.
“Once the community mobilisation, identification and selection processes are completed, the information garnered from the poorest households would be entered onto the Social Register in the states and the National Register at NIBSS, after which the cash transfers would be disbursed to the beneficiaries,” Akande added.
