If a lie is repeated severally unchallenged, chances are that it will begin to assume the status of truth, it is on this score that the Presidential Amnesty Programme (PAP) has taken the fight back to those behind the misleading information in the media, especially the online platforms and some traditional media, that are determined to set right thinking members of the public against the leadership of the programme.
PAP, which has been watching with keen interest the unsubstantiated statements attributed to some mischief makers hiding under pseudonyms, would have ordinarily not join issues with faceless persons as such an exercise would only elevate the enterprise of those bad hats.
However, the PAP needs to put the records straight to prevent stakeholders and the public from being exposed to the toxic narrative in the media space.
For the avoidance of doubt, the present leadership of the Presidential Amnesty Programme under the General Barry Ndiomu, (rtd) assumed office on September 19, 2022 inheriting several liabilities ranging from unpaid scholarship awards, uncompleted vocational training centers, non-formal education programmes and a huge financial burden to contend with among other challenges.
For instance, instead of cancelling the inconclusive scholarship awarded by his predecessor and initiating a fresh one as most persons would have done, General Ndiomu rather sanitized and adopted the process with payment of all fees of one thousand, seven hundred (1700) PAP students spread across tertiary institutions of learning across the country and an additional fifty-five (55) delegates going into their first year in various universities in different countries.
This is in addition to one thousand three hundred (1300) students already deployed to various tertiary institutions within Nigeria and overseas in the previous year bringing the total number of students to three thousand (3000) whose scholarships covering tuition and In-Training-Allowance (ITA) have been paid in full by the administration of General Ndiomu for the 2022/2023 academic session.
It is therefore mischievous, uncharitable and ungodly for those insinuating that PAP under the current dispensation is yet to deploy delegates under the scholarship programme. It is also regrettable that while PAP had in the recent past announced payment of all outstanding scholarship debts to the tune of seven billion Naira (N7bn) for the 2022/2023 academic session, those destabilizing agents are using aspects of the media to give a negative spin to the success story of the Interim Administrator. There are also efforts by the PAP to launch the Formal Education Trust Fund and when operational, will be an added boost to the formal education scheme of the PAP.
On the vocational training centers designed to provide skills for the teeming youths in the region when completed, the present administration inherited five (5) centers sited in states within the region and unfortunately, no vendor or contractor of any of the centers got payment before September 19, 2022. It is on record that all the vendors who were owed prior to when the current management assumed office have been paid. Relevant higher institutions of learning, training institutes and development partners have undertaken spot assessments to re-evaluate existing infrastructure, update software and service equipment including those left at Boro Town after it was burgled to bring the centers including an additional one to be sited in Bayelsa up to speed and eminent take-off. The management under General Ndiomu has also cleared all debts related to ongoing training schemes to the tune of four point five billion naira (N4.5bn) as at March 2023.
Under General Ndiomu, a total of eight hundred and forty-seven (847) delegates are undergoing training in the National Information Technology Development Agency(NITDA) in various ICT specialized fields with certification in digital marketing, e-mail marketing, social media marketing, computer appreciation, search engine optimization as well as technical and computer writing. Similarly, the PAP is sponsoring seventy-five (75) pilots and aircraft engineers to South Africa and France for type-rating as part of the Programme’s aviation training scheme which General Ndiomu is very passionate about. A breakdown of the figure indicates that thirty-five (35) delegates are pilots while forty (40) are billed for aircraft engineering.
All inherited debts have also been paid off through the deployment of a strategic bouquet of financial models. Some of those debts were owed to some critical contractors and agencies. Others are capital and recurrent obligations.
General Ndiomu came with innovative ideas and on assumption, initiated new programmes to enhance the socio-economic sustainability of ex-agitators and young people in the Niger Delta. A major boost to that initiative was the launching of the PAP Cooperative Scheme with an initial sum of one billion, five million naira (N1.5) as seed money in the account with an additional one hundred million naira (N100m) operational fund to be solely managed by the ex-agitators. The cooperative scheme has an eminent jurist, Justice Francis Tabai, a retired Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria as chair of the board with a team of experienced consultants to assist in nurturing the cooperative into fruition. This will create a conducive environment for small businesses to grow to become the catalyst for economic development in the Niger Delta.
The Interim Administrator and his team inherited a payment list fraught with irregularities such as multiple entries of the same accounts.
Further verification of the payment list revealed that certain beneficiaries had multiple accounts linked to their BVNs. In total 513 beneficiaries had 1370 accounts on the payment list linked to their BVNs. Other anomalies were that of certain accounts not linked to their BVNs, this group had a total of 2601 accounts.
*Summary of suspended accounts:*
*Category 1:*
Accounts do not exist. 711
BVN not linked to Account 1885
Invalid BVN. 5
Total. 2601
*Category 2:*
BVN of 513 beneficiaries linked to 1370 accounts.
To rectify those irregularities a portal was created, *_stver.osapnd.gov.ng* by
PAP for the affected beneficiaries to log in and those with multiple accounts linked to their BVNs were to choose just one account in order to have their payments regularised.
So far 1193 of the 2601 accounts suspended under Category 1 have been cleared and their arrears paid in full to date while 368 of the 513 beneficiaries suspended for having multiple accounts linked to their BVNs in Category 2 have been cleared with their arrears also paid in full to date.
A total of 1561 have been cleared and paid in full to date and presently, multiple account fraud has been eradicated from the payment list.
The administration has also created opportunities for forty (40) youths, both male and female from the Niger Delta to be gainfully employed in the PAP to enable them add value to their lives thereby reducing the culture and cycle of dependency.
The Presidential Amnesty Programme has gained a huge mileage from September last year through the initiatives introduced by General Ndiomu and his managerial acumen has impacted positively on the Programme. Unfortunately, the lies and blackmail will not deter the Interim Administrator from doing what is right by the majority of ex-agitators and the people of the Niger Delta.
It is, therefore, necessary that the media as the watch dog of the Society do not lap on just information thrown at it by some shaddy characters without a through investigation of such ‘salacious’ information. The media in Nigeria have evolved and as watchdog of the society, have always pitched its tent in the camp of truth and working together they could assist PAP in changing the socio-economic narrative of the Niger Delta towards positive directions. It should not be used by corrupt elements in the region to scuttle the good ideas behind the establishment of the programme by the government.
Freston Akpor
SA Media to the
Interim Administrator
