The Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, has disagreed with President Muhammadu Buhari, over his recent statement that he will not pay the N5, 000 stipends to vulnerable and unemployed youth in the country.

The President had during the weekend in Qatar said he would not pay N5, 000 stipends promised to the less privileged and unemployed youth in the country.

He said, “I would rather do the infrastructure, the school and correct them and empower agriculture, mining so that every able bodied person can go and get work instead of giving 5,000, to those who don’t work.”

The statement which did not go down well with many Nigerians prompted the Vice President to issue a statement through his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, on Monday February 29, insisting that the N5, 000 stipend dismissed by the President still holds water as it was enshrined in the 2016 budget.

Although, he clarified that the President had never promised to pay unemployed graduates N5, 000, but the decision was adopted by the party to care for the poorest of the poor.

Osinbajo said, “The budget for 2016, which has been submitted to the National Assembly, has made an allocation of half a trillion naira, the first time in the history of this country’s budget where you have that huge chunk of money allocated for social investment.

“In that N500 billion, which is half a trillion naira, close to about 20 per cent of the entire budget, there are six social safety net programmes. And one of them is the conditional cash transfer where government is going to pay N5, 000 monthly to the vulnerable and extremely poor Nigerians. That promise stands.

“The President never promised to pay unemployed graduates N5, 000; the President never made that promise and the government never made that claim that it will pay N5, 000 to unemployed graduates.

“The programme for unemployed graduates is the direct creation of half a million teaching jobs so that they will be trained; 50, 0000 unemployed graduates will be trained to teach and they will be deployed to teach, while they are looking for their career paths or jobs. That still stands.

“In addition to that, there is also a scheme to train 370, 000 non-graduate youths for skill acquisition and vocational training.

“During the time of that training, they will also be paid. So the President did not say that he would be giving unemployed graduates N5, 000.

“The N5, 000 monthly, which is already in the budget, is for the vulnerable Nigerians and the extremely poor, and this year, by the grace of God, once the budget is okay, one million extremely poor Nigerians will receive N5, 000 monthly,” Osinbajo reiterated.