You're Not Going Back To The Streets.... - FG Tell N-power Batch A & B

By CKN

The current beneficiaries of the N-Power programme were grilled by fear since the outbreak of the news that, the current enrollees of the N-Power programme, will exit the scheme on June 30 and July 31, 2020, for Batch A and B respectively.

Their fear is however understandable, as the programme remain only source of income to majority of beneficiaries, and most of them are even married with kids hoping for the continuity of the scheme. This literary means that the end of the programme will spell doom to many households.

But wait a minute, the minister did not say that you're going to be exited from the scheme without anything to hold unto. She stated categorically that the beneficiaries will be transitioned into government entrepreneurship schemes, and some bodies of private sectors are also engaged to absorb some of the beneficiaries.

The Minister Said in their official Twitter handle; 'We have commenced the transitioning of beneficiaries from Batches A and B into government entrepreneurship schemes, and engaging private sector bodies to absorb some of the beneficiaries, after the completion of psychometric assessment to determine competency and placement into various opportunities'.

She equally reiterated the commitment of the Federal government to continuation and expansion of the programme, as such will enable new Batch to be onboard, and acquire Skills for entrepreneurship and job creation.

First of all, let me clarify beneficiaries about government entrepreneurship schemes; Entrepreneurship is the process of creating value, by bringing together a unique package of resources to exploit an opportunity. An entrepreneur is ordinarily called a businessman, who combines capital and labour for the purpose of production, organizes and manages a business unit and assumes risk meant for profit.

Government Development Entrepreneurship programme in Nigerian include; National Directorate of Employment (NDE), National Open Apprenticeship Scheme (NOAS) and, the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Association of Nigeria (SMEDAN).

The Nigerian Government promotes entrepreneurial culture through initiatives that build business confidence, positive attitude, pride in success, support and encouragement of new ideas, social responsibility, providing technological supports, encouraging inter-firm linkages and promotion of research and development.

Four major areas these entrepreneurship programme addresses are; a) Small Scale Enterprises programme, b) Vocational skill development programme, c) Rural employment promotion programme, and d) Special public work programme.

Therefore, psychometric test will determine which area someone should be placed, that is from ones intellectual ability, to make sure that you will be placed in area that suits your ability.

The N-Power Programme was inaugurated in 2016 under the National Social Investment Programme (NSIP), with the mandate of lifting citizens out of poverty through capacity building, investment, and direct support. The programme has enrolled 500,000 beneficiaries so far, with 200,000 from Batch A which started in September 2016, and 300,000 from Batch B which kicked off in August 2018.

The beneficiaries were supposed to spend not less than 24 months on the programme, and were spread across the key industries targeted by the programme; agriculture, health, education, and tax.

I hope this article will address most of the challenges beneficiaries are facing right now, like there next move after the programme.