Tinubu React To Buhari’s Payment Of N5000 Stipend

THE National Leader of the All Progressives
Congress, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has
commended President Muhammadu Buhari
for the commencement of the payment of
N5,000 each to the poor and most
vulnerable under the Conditional Cash
Transfer programme of the present
administration.
The programme was part of the cardinal
promises of Buhari during the 2015
campaign.
Asiwaju Tinubu said the stipend for the
poor was a sign of the Buhari-led APC
government’s commitment to people’s
welfare.
He said in a statement by his Media Office:
“I commend President Buhari for keeping faith
with his campaign promise. I commend him for
empathizing with the poor and the most vulnerable
among us.
“The payment could n’t have come at a better time
than now. The stipend is a sign of the
government’s commitment to people’s welfare. We
must all unite to beat poverty and bring prosperity
to the land.”
Tinubu again called for support for the
present administration, saying with such,
the government would soon turn things
around for the benefit of the people.
President Buhari had started the payment
of N5,000 each to one million poor
Nigerians under its Conditional Cash
Transfer programme, which is one of his
cardinal campaign promises.
Under the programme, the President had
promised to empower one million poor
and most vulnerable with the N5,000
monthly stipend each.
The programme is under the government’s
Social Investment Programmes, where
N30,000 monthly stipends were earlier paid
to 200,000 youths under the N-Power
programme, which began in December
2016, and the School Feeding programme.
The commencement of the N5,000 payment
was announced on Monday in a statement
from the Office of the Vice-President, Prof.
Yemi Osinbajo.
The statement, signed by the Vice-
President’s spokesman, Laolu Akande, said
the first batch of payment would cover
nine states.
Akande said some of the beneficiaries had
started receiving their payments since
December 30, 2016.
Akande had said funds for the payments to
beneficiaries in Borno, Kwara and Bauchi
States were released last week to the
Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System, the
platform that hosts and validates payments
for all government’s SIP.
He said the funds for another set, which
included Cross Rivers, Niger, Kogi, Oyo,
Ogun and Ekiti States, would follow soon to
complete the first batch of beneficiaries.
According to Akande, the nine pilot states
were chosen because they had an existing
Social Register that successfully identified
the most vulnerable and poorest Nigerians.
He said the registers emerged through a
tried and tested community-based targeting
method working with the World Bank
while other states were developing their
social registers and would be included in
subsequent phases.
Akande said the Federal Government
would commence community mobilisation
for the creation of the social registers in
more states to expand the scope and reach
of the Conditional Cash Transfer across the
country , alaba TV news .