The Oyo State Government in Southwest Nigeria has announced its allocation of N8,633,996,464 for distributing palliatives to 200,000 households across the state.
This initiative, called Sustainable Action for Economic Recovery (SAfER), is a response to the removal of fuel subsidies in the country.
This decision emerged from discussions during the weekly State Executive Council meeting at the Executive Council Chamber of the Governor’s Office in Secretariat, Agodi, Ibadan, held on Tuesday.
While briefing newsmen shortly after the Exco meeting, the Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Prince Dotun Oyelade, disclosed that Governor Seyi Makinde would flag off the distribution in Oyo Town, while the Deputy Governor, Bayo Lawal, would do the same in Saki, as other government officials would also flag-off simultaneously across seven zones of the state.
Oyelade noted that the list of the beneficiaries was drawn using the COVID-19 register as a baseline, saying the latest register of 200,000 beneficiaries was an improvement on the register of 100,000 people who were captured then with a plan of expanding the map.
He stated that the government was adopting the multi-level distribution method to ensure faster efficiency and effectiveness, with the hope that the distribution would positively impact the economy in the long run.
On his part, the Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, Prof. Musibau Babatunde, explained that a total N8, 633, 996, 464 is to be spent by both the state and local governments for the palliatives, disclosing that out of the figure, the state would spend N5,997,124,964 in its capacity.
Babatunde, who doubles as the Secretary of the 15-man palliative committee on the SAfER package, said 200, 000 households were being targeted which would translate to about one million families to be impacted through the palliatives.
He further said about N149.1 million would be spent on the aspect of transportation in terms of subsidy cost in the state-owned mass transit buses and N2.6 billion would be spent on food palliatives by the state government, with the local governments equally spending the same amount.
The commissioner noted that in the area of food security as support for agropreneurs and smallholder farmers, N1.7billion would be expended, with N510million budgeted for Small/Medium Enterprises (SME) loans, while in the area of healthcare, N1billion would be expended on 50,000 pensioners and 100, 000 vulnerables across the state.
Babatunde assured that civil servants who are on basic minimum wage; security agencies, including the Amotekun Corps, Police, Civil Defence and the Army, among others had also been considered to be captured as beneficiaries of the palliatives.
He said other dignitaries that would be flagging off the distribution simultaneously in other parts of the state include: the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Prof Olanike Adeyemo (Iseyin); the Chief of Staff, Otunba Segun Ogunwuyi (Ogbomoso); Speaker, Oyo State House of Assembly, Adebo Ogundoyin (Ibarapa); Deputy Speaker, Mohammed Fadeyi (Ona Ara); and Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Dr Wasiu Olatubosun (Ibadan North West).
In her remarks, the Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Inclusion, Mrs Toyin Balogun, said the government was placing a premium on feedback mechanism with the flag-off of the palliatives distribution, which would be done in phases to allow room for improvement, urging residents and beneficiaries to feel free to report back areas of friction or wherever they have issues.
Balogun, who described the Makinde-led government as a listening administration, noted that input and feedback gathered from the first phase of the distribution would help make better arrangements in subsequent efforts, saying the template to be adopted was not cast in stone.
