FG ‘clears’ N-Power payments, to enrol new 1m beneficiaries

The federal government says all backlog payments of N-power beneficiaries have been cleared.

Sadiya Farouq, minister of humanitarian affairs, disaster management, and social development, said this during a workshop organised by her ministry on effective media reporting in Abuja on Thursday.

President Muhammadu Buhari in his message to commemorate the workers’ day celebration had announced plan to double the beneficiaries of the N-Power programme from 500,000 to one million.

Farouq said her ministry is about to conclude new enrolments of one million beneficiaries under Batch C of the social investment programme.

She said that the N-Power is another component of the national social investment programme (NSIP) is designed to stem the growing tide of poverty, unemployment and social insecurity in Nigeria.

Last year, there were complaints from beneficiaries over non-payment of their monthly allowances.

Farouq said that her ministry encountered challenges with the government integrated financial management information system (GIFMIS) which caused the delay.

She explained that the accountant-general’s office identified that out of the 516,600 N-Power beneficiaries’ data it received in April, about 14,020 were not paid because their account details already exist in other ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).

She, however, said that once the accountant general’s office had resolved the issue, the allowance would be released to those who were eligible.

Speaking at the workshop, the minister said: “I don’t think we still have the issue of N-Power backlog. We have sorted that out with the office of the Accountant General of the Federation.

“It has been a very tedious process but as at the last count, we have paid all the beneficiaries after the series of processes.

“N-Power is the job creation and economic component of the NSIP for young unemployed Nigerians. It has provided temporary income-generating opportunities for 500,000 unemployed youths of Batches A and B N-Power beneficiaries.

“Currently, the Ministry is about concluding the enrolment of 1,000,000 Batch-C applicants in two streams of 500,000 in the first instance and another 500,000 later”.

The minister also said that under the national social register, a total number of 6,969,230 households and 29,766,599 persons had been captured; and about 4,000,000 households and 20,000,000 persons will be added to it.

She added that one million households and 5.6 million persons had been captured under the conditional cash transfer (CCT), while plans are underway to add another batch of 1,000,000 households and 5,600,000 persons to the CCT.

The N-power program, established by the federal government in 2016, is designed to recruit unemployed young graduates, and they are given an allowance of N30,000 per month.