Details are emerging on how the Federal Government determined the beneficiaries of the Conditional Cash Transfer who are now receiving the N5,000 monthly stipends across the nine pilot states.
In a press release, Laolu Akande, senior special assistant on media and publicity in the office of the Vice President, said the nine states were Bauchi, Borno, Cross Rivers, Ekiti, Kwara, Kogi, Niger, Osun and Oyo.
Akande clarified that reference to Ogun instead of Osun, among the pilot states, in his last press statement on the issue was an error.
In his press update on the progress of the Muhammadu Buhari administration’s Social Investment Programmes (SIP), at the weekend, Akande explained how the Community-Based Targeting (CBT), model of the World Bank was used two years ago to identify most of the beneficiaries in the pilot states, as the World Bank was also an active agent in the entire process.
According to Akande, “there is no way anyone can describe the selection of the beneficiaries of the CCT as partisan, as the beneficiaries from eight of the nine pilot states were picked even before this administration came into office.
“First, the officials at Federal level, working with the State officials, identify the poorest local government areas, using an existing poverty map for the State, then the LG officials identify the poorest communities in the LGAs and we send our teams there.
“The first thing our team does after selection of the LGAs is to select members of the NOA, the LGA and community officials to form the CBT team. Then we train the selected officials on how to conduct Focus Group discussions at community level. These focus groups comprise of women, men, youth, as the community determines.
However, Kwara State government has confirmed receipt of monthly national cash transfer of N5,000 meant to be paid to the poor masses in Nigeria from the Federal Government, just as some residents who spoke with BusinessDay in Ilorin, the state capital, commended the pro-poor gesture.
Aminat Yahya-Bagudu, head of unit, Conditional Cash Transfer at the Kwara State Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development, said 10,700 persons were currently benefiting from the pro-poor national conditional cash transfer scheme established by Federal Government to alleviate poverty.
Yahya-Bagudu, who said the programme was part of the economic components designed by Federal Government to tackle poverty in the country, said the beneficiaries had started receiving the payment of N5,000 monthly each from the Federal Government.
”10,700 households are currently benefiting from the first phase of Federal Government’s National Cash Transfer Programme in Kwara State. Under the scheme, 12 local government areas are participating in the phase while the remaining four local government areas are being considered to benefit in the second phase,” Yahya-Bagudu said.
While explaining that the selection process was based on data collected for the World Bank supported Youth Employment and Social Support Operation (YESSO), where each community identified those considered as poor, she noted that the process was transparent and devoid of any influence.
She, however, added that the second phase of the programme would commence as soon the social register was shared with her unit for the payment of the N5,000 monthly stipend.
On current hitches in payment in some places, she said the selected banks had engaged the services of a consulting firm in order to decentralise payment process to all beneficiaries across the state.
Some beneficiaries, who spoke with our correspondent on the condition of anonymity in both Ilorin South and East local government areas, confirmed receipt of the pro-poor stipend, but appealed to the Federal Government to work on the inflation and provide critical infrastructure across the country in order for them to effectively control poverty level and improve on people’s standard of living.
