N-power: Call for Monday 8th March, 2021 National Protest intensified

The exited beneficiaries of the N-power Programme have intensified plans for a National Protest as they further allege delay tactics and uncertainty on the implementation of the NEXIT Plan three months down it's launch.

The Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development had on the 27th of November, 2020 announced that it had notched up a key milestone towards providing seamless exit for Batch A and B N-power beneficiaries through a collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria codenamed NEXIT.

Upon releasing the application portal https://nexit-fmhds.cbn.gov.ng on 30th November, 2020, hope was heightened among the N-power Beneficiaries as their exit was sudden amidst COVID-19 Pandemic, with nothing to fall back on coupled with cases of backlogs of unpaid Stipends which lingered for some thousands of the beneficiaries.

Hope began to wither among the N-power Beneficiaries when the portal https://nexit-fmhds.cbn.gov.ng could not deliver it's purpose efficiently ranging from verification email delivery failure to unrecognition of some of the beneficiaries by the portal, while the attentiveness in resolving the issues faded with the days, weeks and now months.

According to the N-power Beneficiaries, the initial plan was to transit them to the CBN Intervention Programmes such as the AGSMEIS Loan Scheme and Anchor Borowers Programme. However, confusion set in when the Humanitarian Affairs Minister, Sadiya Umar Farouk announced a change of plan, stating equivocally that 200,000 beneficiaries will be engaged as financial services operators under the Shared Agent Network Expansion Facility (SANEF), 30,000 beneficiaries as geospatial experts and enumerators in the Economic Sustainability Plan’s Mass Agric programme while others will have the option of benefiting from the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP) micro-enterprise loans as contained in The Nation https://thenationonlineng.net/fg-announces-new-plan-for-n-power-beneficiaries.

N-power Youth Congress and N-Power REPs made demands

The N-power Youth Congress while declaring 14th February, 2021 Ultimatum demanded that:

1. N-power Beneficiaries selected for permanent jobs be confirmed with appointment letters.

2. Those selected for grant/Loan be given at least 1 million naira each.

3. Those considered for loan be treated fairly. That is,

* 2 years moratorium

* 3% interest rate per annum

* Reasonable amount enough for the respective purposes be given.

4. Those still finding it difficult to register the Nexit Portal should be given attention to that effect.

The 36 States and FCT N-Power Representatives had requested that:

1. They (the 36 States and FCT N-Power Representatives) should be brought and shown the template of the purported Transition plan.

2. The Transition Plan ( whether absorption into Government agencies or meaningful grants/Loan for entrepreneurship) must be ready and clearly defined.

3. Payments of over 14, 000 Unpaid Volunteers from the Month of March to July, 2020 must begin immediately as all documents needed for this have been supplied by the volunteers 2 months ago.

4. Payments of Backlogs to Volunteers being owed in different months must be paid immediately.

5. All Batch B devices and some batch A devices must be delivered immediately as this forms part of the agreement of engagement adding that nothing short of the above request will be accepted.

Long Silence Trigger call for Protest:

The N-power Beneficiaries condemning what they described as demeaning silence and inhuman treatments have declared a National Protest on Monday 8th March, 2021, stating that since their plight have remained a playground of political promises, they would be left with no option than to continue on National Protests to let the world know what they have been through and what they are going through as citizens of Nigeria who have dedicated their years in a special service to the Nation.