Successful applicants for the federal government’s proposed 774,000 jobs slot, under the Extended Special Public Works Programme, will be paid through bank accounts, using Bank Verification Numbers (BVN).
Addressing the media in Abuja, Minister of State, Labour and Employment, Mr Festus Keyamo said that government settled for the measure to entrench a system of transparency and to avoid double payments to applicants during the implementation.
The Minister who jointly addressed the media with the Director General of the National Directorate of Employment NDE Dr Nasir Ladan, said that biometrics of successful applicants would be captured by the banks during the process.
According to him, arrangements with the banks will be concluded in the next few days to ensure that there is transparency in the process.
“We are going to conclude with the banks to ensure that we are transparent and the banks will tell Nigerians exactly how they want to go about this in all the local governments in the country.
“Everybody’s biometrics will be taken by the banks to ensure that you don’t have two different accounts. Within the next few weeks we will do that.
“Everybody’s biometrics will be taken by the banks to ensure that you don’t have two different accounts. Within the next few weeks we will do that.
“President Muhammadu Buhari has given a clear directive for this programme to be totally free of fraud, everybody will be paid by a bank account and BVN,” he said.
The Minister disclosed that there would be implementation of State selection committees at different levels to ensure proper documentation of those being selected adding that the different selection committees would work closely with the banks.
According to Keyamo, the State Selection Committees, will also select the projects to be done and will supervise the different works that will be done in the various local governments.
“In other words, we do not want to give people money, sit down in Abuja and assume that the community services are going on everywhere.
“We are going to have people on the ground, implementation committee supervising the work.
“Over the next few days the Director-General and myself will put our synergies and announce these committees across the country,” Keyamo said.
The Minister said the President has also directed the use of technology to monitor the process by setting up an interactive website between his office and that of the Director General of NDE to ensure transparency.
“The projects that are going to done in every LGA will be uploaded, so the public will be very clear, there will be no hanky panky, no hide and sick,” Mr Keyamu stressed.
He said every LGA can open a (website) and indicate the community service to be done in the LGA with clear addresses of those jobs to be done.
The Director general of the National Directorate of Employment NDE, Dr Nasir Ladan said that the Agency was ready to start the implementation of the programme.
“As far as I am concerned, the issue of special public works is fully ready. We believe the October 1, date as a reality.
“The selection committees have sent their reports to us and we have made some corrections and adjustments and we are good to go.
“For the implementation, we have four State Implementation Committees, then we have three local government monitoring committees in each of the LGA’s, money has been budgeted for their payments.
“They are just to make sure that, the list that were presented, they are well documented because we are also going to use them in terms of identifying the possible intervention or project sites that are to be carried out in each of these 774 LGA’s,” Dr Ladan said
The Special Public Works Program SPW, is designed by the present adminstration as an intervention to poverty alleviation, job creation and fiscal stimulus measures to cushion hardship caused by the Corona virus pandemic to poor Nigerians at the grass root level.
The programme, approved by Buhari, is aimed principally at recruiting 774,000 itinerant and unskilled Nigerians.
The exercise which is expected to begin in October and end in December 2020 will cost the federal government 52 billion naira, which will go into payment of the participants at N20,000 per month for three months and other logistic arrangements.
The Extended Special Public Works Programme is designed to employ 1,000 unskilled workers in each of the 774 Local Government Areas in Nigeria for road rehabilitation, construction, sanitation, among others.