N330 billion: On the march again with cash transfers, by Adekunle Adekoya

THE media was awash with reports earlier in the week that the Federal Government has paid out the sum of N330 billion in cash transfers to poor and vulnerable households in the country through the  National Social Safety-net Coordinating Office. This development was made known to Nigerians by no less a person than the chief manager of the Nigerian economy, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr. Olawale Edun.

In the course of the announcement, Mr. Eduna said that there were about 19.7 million poor and vulnerable households in Nigeria and over 70 million individuals on the National Social Register. We were also informed that the cash transfers are being done from an $800 million facility of the World Bank.

Edun explained further: “This is part of plan by Mr. President to get the social protection programme that he had in mind to help the poorest and most vulnerable through difficulties caused by increase in the price level, as we all know, as part of the necessary reforms that were put in place.

“We are pleased to report that the social protection programme, the putting in place of a safety net to help people, to cope with the rising price level is now firmly back on track.

“Of the 20 million households on the social register, covering about 75 million Nigerians, the programme was for 15 million households, covering 75 million Nigerians, 8.5 million households have now been paid at least one tranche of the funds promised to them — N25,000.

“They have two more payments to go. Some have received two, and some have received three.”

I thought that this programme of official profligacy ended with the Buhari regime, which birthed and sustained it throughout the eight-year tenure of the late Katsina general. I didn’t know that the it had been adopted, and in fact, rolled over from the Buhari tenure into the Tinubu administration. There are a lot of things that are wrong with this programme.

When the Buhari administration announced it and “conditional cash transfers” were being made to some fellow compatriots, one of the questions asked was the on the generation of the social register. Those questions were largely ignored then, and even up till now, though they remained valid. One of the questions was which criteria were used to determine who was a vulnerable Nigerian? How were vulnerable Nigerians identified? How were they enrolled? 

Buhari started with the sum of N5,000 which most Nigerians felt did not get to the real poor people. I asked then: What could N5,000 do for any Nigerian, even under Buhari when petrol sold for N187/per litre? A bag of rice sold for around N40,000 under Buhari. After Buhari came Tinubu who removed subsidy and a bag of rice started selling for N100,000 with petrol selling for just under N1,000 in most parts of the country. Now, they are paying N25,000 to their poor and vulnerable, five times what Buhari paid. And the question remains valid again: What can N25,000 do for a household (picture average couple with four children)?

With the prevailing prices of food items and high transportation costs, N25,000 cannot last a household beyond 48 hours. What this means is that the money cannot make any meaningful impact on the lives of those who get it; if they get it. In Yoruba thinking, it is water poured on the back of a calabash or right inside a basket. No trace of it a short while thereafter. If people in government really thought this programme through and holistically reviewed its impementation under Buhari, it ought to have been jettisoned altogether.

As bad as things are, N330 billion, judiciously appropriated to needy sectors of the economy will impact more meaningfully on the deliverables government is targeting than cash transfers. If the education sector gets N330 billion, the noise being made by ASUU and other unions will go down substantially. Or the health sector — the doctors would not be threatening strikes all the time. And roads? Less Nigerians will die in motor accidents caused by dilapidated roads. The list is endless of what better value N330 billion could have purchased for us as a nation.

Then there is the economics of it. The cash transfers are being funded from a World Bank facility of $800 million. That is a lot of money. $800 million converted to Naira at the prevailing exchange rate will make the Naira look like confetti. Is that why it is being spent anyhow? Where in the world do people borrow money to fund consumption? A loan from the World Bank could be better utilised on projects that can generate revenues for its repayment, but not this one. After a family gets its N25,000 and a pot of soup and measure of rice or garri is bought from it, what remains? Zip. That is why this cash transfer programme never made sense to me, and never will.

Back to how people were enrolled on the social register. Why am I not there? Or any of my poor neighbours in the suburb of Lagos that I live? Or folk in the sleepy little village I hail from in Ogun State? There must be better ways to waste resources than this. Worse, no provision for it in the budget as Mr Edun disclosed that the special funds will now be in budgets for the programme. And the National Assembly is not seeing anything wrong with these out-of-budget expenditures. What profligacy? We are on the march again. Amid worsening poverty, we still find enough money to waste. What a country! What a government? TGIF.

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