President Muhammadu Buhari has announced the addition of 1 million households to the National Social Register (NSR) up from 2.6 million households to cushion the effect of the impact of the coronavirus.
President Buhari said this in a second nationwide broadcast on Monday. He said the addition should be done in the next two weeks.
He said a technical committee will submit a report on the development to him “by the end of this week.”
“I have also directed that the current social register be expanded from 2.6 million households to 3.6 million households in the next two weeks,” Mr Buhari said. “This means we will support an additional one million homes with our social investment programs.”
“A technical committee is working on this and will submit a report to me by the end of this week,” he explained.
According to a 2018 report by the World Bank, almost half the Nigerian population is living below the international poverty line ($2 per day), and unemployment peaked at 23.1 per cent.
NSR
The NSR is an initiative under the National Safety Net cordinating office, NASSCO in collaboration with the the Youth Employment and Support Operation (YESSO), a World Bank assisted programme.
The scheme identifies the poorest households in given communities. After identification, their details are uploaded into the NSR, after which the National Cash Transfer Office (NCTO) then pays the beneficiaries.
President Buhari also ordered the extension of the lockdown by another 14-days in Lagos Abuja and OgunState as efforts to curtail the spread of the coronavirus.
The first lockdown was meant to end by Monday night.