SURE-P Is Broke, Kolade Tells Senate

The chairman of the Subsidy Re-investment Empowerment Programme (SURE-P), Dr. Christopher Kolade, has told the Senate Committee on SURE-P that, from October, the N10,000 payments to 110,000 beneficiaries of SURE-P may be stopped due to paucity of funds.

According to Kolade, SURE-P disburses N10,000 on a monthly basis to 3,000 people across the 36 states, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

He told the lawmakers that SURE-P had targeted 5,000 beneficiaries but had to start with a pilot 3000 beneficiaries due to financial constraints, and reminded the Abdul Ningi-led Senate Committee that SURE-P had initially forwarded a request of N28 billion to the National Assembly but lawmakers had appropriated only N9 billion, and ignored  complaints and the requests for reconsideration

Giving a analysis of SURE-P allocations, Kolade said that SURE-P received N180 billion last year and about N105 billion in 2013. He said SURE-P pays about N13 billion to beneficiaries monthly.

“As from this month, we will have problems, not only that we are unable to meet our target; those young men, we are likely to go to them at the end of the programme to say, ‘sorry we cannot continue with this’. This will damage the credibility of this programme,” Kolade said to the senators.



FG Dumps Oronsaye Report On Rationalisation Of MDAs

The federal government is planning to dump the Steve Oronsaye report on the rationalisation of government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) on the grounds that some of the (MDAs) are underpinned by law which cannot be repealed in the short run.

The FG is also planning to shelve the sacking of civil servants next year and to focus on works, power, education and other keys sectors of the economy.

This is contained in the 2014- 2016 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) submitted by President Goodluck Jonathan to the National Assembly.

According to the report, the FG had hoped to save money via the MDAs rationalisation but that is no longer feasible.