Nigerian govt distributes N10 billion to 300,000 poor Nigerians

The federal government has since 2016
distributed N10 billion to no fewer than
300,000 beneficiaries through its
Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT)
programme.
Temitope Sinkaye, the national
programme coordinator of the CCT,
disclosed this to the News Agency of
Nigeria (NAN) on the sidelines of the
National Cash Transfer Programme Mid-
year Reviewed in Ilorin today, Tuesday, July,
3.
She said that the programme started in
2016 with eight pilot states that met the
condition set by the federal government.
The condition, Mrs Sinkaye explained,
was just for states to provide offices,
personnel and equipment for the take
off of the programme.
“All states are eligible to participate in
the programme but upon fulfilling some
conditions.
“So currently, we have only 20 states
that have fulfilled the conditions.
“As at 2016 when we started the
programme, only eight states met the
condition and as at today, we have 20
states and we are still counting.
“The condition is that states will provide
the programme with office, staff and
equipment while the federal government
takes it up from there.
“Once the state is done with that, the
federal government takes up from there
and train the personnel on what the
programme is all about,’’ she said.
On the modality for selection of
beneficiaries, the national coordinator
said that they were selected through a
process known as “community based
targeting.’’
“There is a different government agency
that is charged with the responsibility of
identifying the beneficiaries and the
agency is known as the National Social
Safety Net Coordinating Office at the
national office,” Ms Sinkaye said.
She noted that the community based
targeting team of the office at the local
government level move from one
community to another in order to
identify the poorest set of Nigerians
through the help of members of those
communities.
Ms Sinkaye, who said that every
political ward in all states would have
the same number of beneficiaries,
however, said that those that were yet to
key in could not lay claim to the benefit
of previous years.
“The beneficiaries will be on it for three
years; then we will assess their condition
as to whether they are qualified to
graduate out of poverty,” she stated.