The Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani has lambasted the idea of giving N8,000 cash transfers to Nigerians, dubbing the process as a “scam.”
Initially, the government of Nigeria under the leadership of President Bola Ahmad Tinubu has proposed a cash transfer of N8,000 to 12 million household Nigerians for six months, which is aimed at reducing the difficulty caused by the removal of fuel subsidy.
However, the process has caused a lot of controversies on social media among Nigerians, with some seeing it as a method of easing hardship while others are critical of it.
Uba Sani, the Governor of Kaduna State has become the latest name to join in criticizing the process, saying that there is no accurate data of the beneficiaries, calling the program a “complete scam.”
As reported by Punch via Arise Tv, the governor said ” My position has always been that, at this critical time, cash transfer should not be something that we should bring up. I think that cash transfer for me, in my opinion, is a scam. Completely it’s a scam. I can be very certain about that, because who are you transferring the money to?
“Let me give an example, go and check the current statistics. Like I said, as the Chairman, Committee of Banking for four years in Nigeria, I oversight Central Bank, I oversight all the commercial sectors of our economy for the last four years and I looked at the statistics, I will be very firm on this issue and you can go and check it.
“About 70 to 75 per cent of the rural population in North West are financially excluded completely. You will have to go and check, these people we are talking about are important people in the society. They do not even have a bank account so who are you transferring the money to?”
He also calls on the attention of the individuals responsible for the programme to consider those people who are financially excluded, especially in the North Western region and to make sure that they’re brought in to the system before the launching of the programme.
“Let’s try and work very hard to make sure that they are financially included, that is the most important thing and I will like to call on our development partners, the World Bank, to put more money towards bringing more people into the financial services and the vulnerable in particular.
Let’s put more money to ensure that we open accounts for them, get them involved, if we don’t do that, no matter what we do however you do it, money will go to the wrong people, that’s the fact,” said the Governor.