The
acting President, Yemi Osinbajo, on Friday, disclosed that 2.3 million youths
have so far applied for the 300,000 jobs that are still available under the
Federal Government’s N-Power scheme since the portal was reopened in June.
Osinbajo
disclosed this to journalists when he visited the scheme’s Response Centre in
Abuja.
Under
the scheme, which is one of the components of the government’s Social
Investment Programme, 500,000 youths are expected to be engaged.
While
200,000 were employed in the first phase, the portal was reopened on June 13
for the applications to fill the remaining 300,000 vacancies.
Despite
the high number of the applications, however, Osinbajo said the government
would stick to the 500,000 target for now.
He
said a decision on whether to increase the figure in the future would depend on
government’s resources.
The
acting President said, “Already, 200,000 young people have been engaged. And
since the programme was opened, another 2.3 million have applied and we are
looking at the next phase of engagement.
“But
for me, I think what is important is that we are able to do this incrementally
and we are able to give hope to some of these young people who need the
opportunity.
“We
will never always be able to do everything but I think that it is important
that we do as much as we can.
“You
will recall that the target was 500,000 but depending on our resources, we can
always do more. But the target, for now, is 500,000.”
Osinbajo
said the tablets given to beneficiaries contain useful learning materials that
could help develop their skills in a variety of ways and further give them
greater opportunities.
He
said the scheme was more than an employment programme but a skills development
programme that was unprecedented.
Osinbajo
said there was no truth in the reports of the alleged backlog of salaries as
far as the scheme was concerned.
He
said once the Bank Verification Numbers of beneficiaries were verified, they
were paid.
“There
is a problem if your BVN does not match the records you gave. If there is a
problem with any of your records, you cannot be paid.
“The
moment your records are cleared, then you are paid constantly. If you don’t
correct these records, then you might be paying the wrong people,” he said.
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