Poor Nigerians

The Former Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation (FMHADMSD) Sadiya Farouq has been indicted by the National Executive Council (NEC) of robbing the poor through the National Social Investment Program, as the Federal Government begins verification of the National Social Register (NSR).

NSR is an information system that supports the outreach, intake, registration, and determination of potential eligibility for one or more social programs.

In January 2022, Farouq said over 46 million vulnerable Nigerians have been captured on the NSR, and the number was pushed up based on insecurity which led to an increase in displaced persons in need of intervention.

However, in July 2023, NEC which is headed by Vice President Kashim Shettima, dumped former President Muhammadu Buhari’s national social register, describing it as a fraud, phantom, bogus, and ambiguous program, indicting Farouq.

It was under the register that over N3trn was distributed by Farouq in the last few years, according to NEC.

Meanwhile the newly inaugurated Minister of FMHADMSD, Betta Edu, on Friday claimed that the 46 million vulnerable Nigerians captured in the NSR were neither poor nor vulnerable.

Edu said this on Friday during an interview with Channels Television, while responding to questions on the verification of the NSR.

She said, “The first thing which we are starting almost immediately is the verification of the National Social Register.

“For a couple of days and weeks, we have been going back and forth with the governors’ forum and several interested parties, saying ‘the register is okay and not okay.

“We are going to first carry out a full verification of the social register to ensure that truly it is the poorest of the poor, those who deserve to be on that list, that are on that list.

“We will verify, remove, and update the register, and it will be owned by Nigerians both at national, state, and local government areas and even in the community.”

She reiterated that the verification process will cut across the three tiers of government because they complained that one of the challenges, they encounter is non-inclusiveness.

“The process of really getting the poorest of the poor is that we have to have ownership of whatever data that must be used from the grassroots, so we can say these are the poor people, we know them, not just numbers and names, but they are human beings and we can identify them.

“This will be done through the involvement of the NEC, governors, local, traditional rulers, and religious rulers” Edu reiterated.