A Nigerian lawyer and public administrator, Otunba Bisi Adegbuyi, has described the recent decision of the National Economic Council to dump former President Muhammadu Buhari’s national social register, opting for a new one to be developed by each state of the federation, as a welcome development.
He said the decision of both tiers of government to allow each of the states to set up and implement the newly created Infrastructural Trust Fund meant to complement the cash transfer by the states was also novel and a way of facing the reality that states and local governments are closer to the people and that they should be allowed to provide such infrastructures like roads, water, agric, livestock, education and health is also a welcome development.
The council at its meeting on Thursday had described the register under which over N3 trillion was distributed by the previous government as “a fraud, phantom, bogus and ambiguous.”
However, former Nigeria Postmaster General, and CEO of Nigerian Postal Service emphasized the need for state governments to first address the issue of grassroots identification, data recognition and verification if the new approach is not to end up like the previous fraudulent and ambiguous cash transfer policy.
He said “It is imperative that the new process be driven by a bespoke Addressing and Identity Technology (AIT).
“This is to ensure transparency and confidence building.
“In other words, the intended beneficiaries are the vulnerable Nigerians. One of the conditions precedents for the process to be transparent is that beneficiaries should be assigned duly validated digital addresses and means of identification. This will also engender a real-time feedback mechanism for transparency and accountability,” he said.
Adegbuyi said this is necessary so that each state can identify through this Data the Needs of their people and take steps on how best to prioritize such needs with available resources.
According to him, “the socio-economically vulnerable Nigerians must first be digitally identified and addressed as the foundation for compiling a reliable, confidence building integrity based social investment register. This is the minimum condition precedent for a decent state government driven petroleum subsidy removal palliatives. You cannot condemn and discard Buhari’s national cash register as unreliable, lacking integrity and replicate the same at states’ level. That will amount to the pot painting the kettle black.”
Consequently, he added that the Organised Labour in each state led by the Nigeria Labour Congress, and Trade Union Congress must be adequately involved in proper monitoring of the programme towards ensuring that funds and resources get to the proper beneficiaries.
“Civil society organisations in each state must also provide enough monitoring and sensitization such that the programme could achieve its target goal.
“Previous experience where an unverifiable process of disbursement was used is a recipe for disaster.
“On the part of state governments, construction of roads and provision of other infrastructures should reflect more on rural and semi urban areas for the programme to achieve the purpose for which it is meant to achieve.
“The practice of some of our state governments concentrating infrastructural facilities in state capitals and urban areas has been a dissenter to solving problems of poverty, good security, development and growth over the years,” he concluded.
