The federal government Wednesday announced plans to relaunch direct cash transfers to about 12 million vulnerable Nigerians as part of efforts to mitigate biting inflation in the country.

Even though the initiative was initially scheduled to take care of three million vulnerable Nigerians, the government said it would be increased to 12 million in view of the biting economic situation in the country.

Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy Mr. Wale Edun made the disclosure at a retreat organised by the Ministry in Uyo, Akwa Ibom state.

The announcement is coming after President Bola Tinubu had suspended the National Social Investment Programme Agency (NSIPA) in January, an initiative put in place by the Muhammadu Buhari administration to implement the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programme, Tardermoni and a host of others.

These programmes are seen by Nigerians as conduits through which high falutin corruption were being perpetrated, and which partly contributed to the economic quagmire facing the country. 

However, addressing participants at the retreat, Edun said, “the presidential panel on the social investment programmes has prepared to go to Mr. President with an internal recommendation to restart the direct payments to the poorest and the most vulnerable. Everything is being done to ease the pain.

“We know that there’s been about 3 million beneficiaries now, but given the way the rates have gone, there are probably another 12 million people, households that can benefit from that payment.”

The minister stressed that President Tinubu would be briefed on the programme, explaining that technology would be deployed to ensure smooth and transparent payments, as well as avoiding manual processes and delays.

“The only thing delaying that is not waiting for the end of the report. It is something that the intervention is meant to happen immediately.

“We have experts in technology; the commitment was to make sure that we use technology to ensure that we have a seamless payment, a seamless movement between the registered and the direct beneficiaries, without any manual processes in between. So it’s taking time to automate that process immediately that direct payment will resume,” he said.

On the desirability of the cash transfer, the minister said: “History has shown, evidence has shown that when you pay someone directly, you put money in their hand. It reduces poverty because they decide where the shoe is pinching most.

“So it is a direct benefit, it has a direct effect on poverty. It alleviates, and there’s a commitment to immediately start that process. So that is, as far as these interventions are concerned and the landscape which we as a team are facing, we have a commitment to help to bring down inflation.

“Growing the economy, creating jobs and lifting millions and millions of Nigerians out of poverty, that’s the ultimate goal of President Bola Tinubu and his economic policies.”

On what government was doing to arrest the high cost of food items, Edun said:  “The goal is to put food, to put feed into the mill, into the market, in an attempt to drive down the cost of food and make food available. Right now, that is the key priority in terms of the fiscal side, in terms of the government side.”