FG's N5000 stipend not for the lazy - Ngige

The N5000 monthly stipend promised vulnerable Nigerians by the Buhari administration is not without conditions.

Dr Chris Ngige, Minister of Labour and Employment said revealed this on Thursday when he said that the Federal Government's monthly stipend for the unemployed would not be paid to indolent people.

Ngige told newsmen at the APC National Secretariat in Abuja on Thursday that youths who would receive the money would have to pass through skills acquisition and training programs.

He also said that some of the beneficiaries will receive more than N5000.

“We also have the programme on the commission cash transfer. We won’t pay N5000 for people to be indolent. No country in the world, would pay people to go home and sleep and collect cash. So, Nigerian would not be an exception.“We will pay some people N5000, we will pay some N10,000, and even for people in teacher conversion scheme, we will pay more than N10,000, N15,000 as stipend while in training, and then after the training they are going to be employed by state governments and the federal government in different institutions. It is not a programme we shall run alone, the state governments are going to buy into it, they are going to synchronize with us, we are going to do it in synergy,” he said.

He added that the skills acquisition centers across the country would be involved in the program.

His words :
“So we want to get back our youths, capture them, teach them to use their hands, and when they use their hands, they can earn money by employing themselves. If you get a bricklayer, or a painter today, you cannot pay less than N5000 for a daily job. And if somebody is able to work 20 days in a month for N5000, he already has N100,000. But, today it is a sad story, that is why Togolese, Ghanaians, people from Benin Republic, people from Niger Republic that do all these skilled job for us.

“80 percent of workers in that specialized category in construction site all over Nigeria,be it in Abuja, in Lagos or in Onitsha, they come from outside, and we don’t know that little drops of water, form ocean, the money or the naira they are paid is repatriated to their country and all of them will come at the end of the day to put pressure on naira in the foreign exchange market.

“So we have decided that we have to train our own youths, let them use their hands to fend for themselves. We will also want to advance some of them into entrepreneurship. If you are very good, we can open a place for you and give you money through the Bank of Industry and SMEDAN and then you move to the next stage where a number of youth will work with you."