FG to Pay Unemployed Youths and Sets Up Consumer Credit Programme

Its a welcome development that the Federal Government of Nigeria has thought about this initiative looking at the present financial and economic situations in the country.

Addressing the Press after the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting on Monday, the Minister of Finance and coordinating minister of the economy,  Mr Wale Edun, disclosed that tje programme would see unemployed Nigerian youths being paid stipends monthly.

"At this period of heightened food prices, Mr. President has committed to doing all that can be done to assist in giving purchasing  power to the poorest and in that line".

He further went on to say that "  Mr president has committed and instructed that the Social Security Unemployment programme be devised, particularly to cater for the youth, for the unemployed graduates, as well as the society as a whole".

"So, we will roll out, in the nearest future, an unemployment benefits for the young unemployed, in particular, " the Minister announced.

Also, Mr Edun said the FG will urgently establish a consumer credit scheme to alleviate the pains of economic adjustment.

He further explain that the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, will lead a committee that includes the Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, the Attorney-General of the Federation and himself, the Coordinating Minister of the Economy.

"There will be a social consumer credit programme.By making consumer credit available, goods become more affordable, the economy even gets a chance to revive faster, because people will now have the purchasing power that allows them to order goods and products", he stated. 

The Honourable minister also spoke on the review implemented by the Special Presidential panel on the National Social Investment Programme, which has submitted a preliminary report to the President.

He further noted that the President gave the highlights to the Council meeting noting that what was done was "a review of the existing mechanisms, a review of the existing programmmes, and where there have been successes, such as the 400,000 beneficiaries of the GEEP programme".

He added, " So, the direct payments to 12 million households comprising 60 million Nigerians is to resume immediately with the important provision that every beneficiary will be identified by their national identity number and the bank verification number.

Therefore, paymemts will be made into bank accounts or mobile money wallets. So, that whether it is before or after, there is verification og the identity of beneficiaries.

"Each person that receives 25,000 Naira for a total of three months will be identifiable, even after they have receive the money, it will be clear who it went to and when it went them. And that is the big change that has allowed Mr. President to approve the restart of that direct payments to beneficiaries programme."

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On his part, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr Bosun Tijani, explained that beneficiaries would be vetted through their Bank Verification Number and National Identity Numbers to avoid multiple payouts to one individual.

He said, "One of the initial moves that we are making is leveraging the existing dataset that we have on our people. As you know, the BVN is well known to be extremely credible. NIN on the other side, which is now the most popular data identity system for Nigeriansm, is also to a largest and credible, and it covers quite a significant number of people as well.

Lastly, what we are looking to do here is the triangulation of this data set to ensure that not only are we using the register that has been properly populated, but that we also do proper verification of every individual that will benefit from that social investment programme, which means we will get commitment to ensuring that no one is paid twice, because you have to be properly IDed before you can benefit from that programme which is expected to commence from next month.