By Ken Afor
The conditional cash transfer policy for 15 million households will be implemented by the federal government on October 17, 2023, according to Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation Betta Edu.
She disclosed this on Sunday during an interview on Channels Television.
The policy will get on board five months after the federal government abolished the petroleum subsidies regime.
It would be recalled that the conditional cash transfers was an initiative by the former president, Muhammadu Buhari, to assist the poorest of the poor in the country but when the new administration came on board the social register was expanded to accommodate more poor Nigerians.
“With the approval from the President which we hope to get this week, on the 17th of October, we will be officially launching the conditional cash transfer to 15m households in Nigeria,” the minister said.
She claims that in order to obtain a trustworthy register of beneficiaries, the ministry is collaborating with various national stakeholders.
“As we speak, we are having a verification exercise. Every state can bear us witness that we have put boots on the ground – persons who are working with the state cash transfer office as well as the governors who are the heads of the steering committee and then several other persons,” she said.
“All of this is to be sure those who are on the national social register truly are Nigerians who fall [spend] within the under $1.95 a day [range] and they deserve to have it,” the minister added.
Mrs. Betta stated that the purpose of the verification exercise is to clean up the register, even though she acknowledged that some people on the register may have passed away or moved up the economic ladder.
“So, two things. First, as we speak, we are on the field cleaning up that data and doing a complete verification and we are juxtaposing both the BVN, NIM and the rest of it to identify these people and be sure we are dealing with authentic persons,” the 36-year-old said.
“And then, of course, there is biometrics to it and you have a capturing of the head of the household as well as a picture of the household so it can be located. On each of these households, they are numbered so people can go there and verify against the register
