By OLA AJAYI, Ibadan

THE joy of thousands of unemployed youths who are currently engaged in the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment programme, SURE-P of the Federal Government knew no bounds when the project was officially launched in Oyo State last Friday.

It was a hectic day for all security agencies, police, army, the State Security Services to control close to a million people who gathered at the Ibadan Polo Club, Eleyele, Ibadan. It almost became a political rally as beneficiaries of the programme sang praises of President Goodluck Jonathan for the initiative.

Though, President Jonathan was represented by the Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu, beneficiaries of the programme and other PDP stalwarts in the state repeatedly sang his praises for the initiative.

On arrival in the ancient city, the Minister and his entourage headed to the office of the Oyo State Governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi and later to the palace of the Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Samuel Odulana where he was warmly received by the two eminent personalities.

Oba Odulana who spoke through the Otun-Olubadan, Chief Omowale Kuye appreciated the efforts of the Federal Government in initiating the programme, saying it would reduce unemployment drastically. Chief Wogu told the Governor that the purpose of his visit was to share with him the success of the Community Services, Women and Youths in the state and to consider some areas for possible partnership for the maximum benefit of citizens of the state.

He explained that the CSWYE project is a sub-component of the Social Safety Net Programme of the SURE-P which aims at providing stop-gap employment opportunities to women, youths, and other vulnerable persons including physically-challenged persons in their various communities.

The Minister noted that the programme is in consonance with the job creation content of the transformation agenda of the present administration. Giving the genesis of the project, he added that it was initiated in 2012 in response to the crisis that emanated due to removal of fuel subsidy.

According to him, it is part of the promises made to Nigerians to apply the savings from the partial removal of oil subsidy to human capital and infrastructure development that would promote living conditions of the ordinary Nigerians and boost economic growth.

He added that the actual implementation of the project commenced in 2012 in the Federal Ministry of Finance on a pilot scale in 14 states of the federation including Oyo. He noted  that the benefits of the programme are already manifesting in the state with a total of 3,500 made up of 1982 male and 1518 female indigenes of the state currently engaged by the project. These beneficiaries, he stressed, are working in 144 service units spread across the 33 local government areas in the state.

“The beneficiaries are reported to be working in compliance with established guidelines, with an estimated mann hours output that total 8,750,000 so far. Our records also show that the beneficiaries have received over N246 million, while the sum of N29 million has been remitted to the state as running cost between February and September this year.

Success of the programme

A summation of these two values indicate that Oyo State has benefitted from the CSWYE project to the tune of over N276million”, he said.

The Minister also gave a summary of the success of the programme in other South West States. According to him, “out of over 6,000 health workers engaged by SURE-P under the maternal and child health programme, 1,060 were engaged from states in the South West to render services in selected primary health centers in the zone”.

“ Over 1,000 health workers comprising 252 midwives, 377 community health extension workers, 431 village health workers have also been engaged. The maternal and child health programme is intervening in 144 primary health centres,” he said,  adding that “the interventions are impacting positively on reduction of infant and maternal mortality and morbidity in the zone”.

Other beneficiaries: He said, “the Benin-Ore-Shagamu road is receiving massive attention as part of the SURE-P’s intervention in infrastructure development.

Three out of the six rail corridors receiving attention under the programme traverse majority of the South West states including the Lagos to Kano rail which is already functional.

Responding, Governor Abiola Ajimobi advised the Peoples Democratic Party-led Federal Government not to use any political affiliation in the management of the programme. He called for the setting up of a committee comprising representatives of both the Federal Government and State Governments in each of the 36 states of the federation that would run the programme.

The Governor said: “What we should know is that it doesn’t matter whether it is PDP or APC or whatever. What matters is that we want to help Nigerians. We are all Nigerians, and the Federal Government is government for all Nigerians. It’s only that Nigeria has been divided into 36 states but not into 36 countries. So I think SURE-P and states must work together to ensure that we help our people and the only way we can help our people is for us to synergise in the areas of SURE-P and other similar programmes.

“What I have seen in Nigeria and in our developmental programmes is that we do more talking than action. I think the earlier we all come together and do things in such a way that people will begin to see the effect, the better,” he said.

Besides, he also said that the committee, if constituted, would ensure synergy between the Federal Government and the state government on the SURE-P scheme and other similar empowerment and poverty alleviation programmes of the states.“I also like to suggest that we have synergy; when I say synergy, I do not so much like the idea of SURE-P being managed without having a Committee of SURE-P with that of the state government that will regularly meet and monitor progress,” the governor said.

The Committee, he maintained, should be concerned with actualising the aims and objectives of the programme and ultimately improve the socio-economic fabrics of the country.

Governor Ajimobi also suggested an increase in the quantum of participants in the SURE-P programme, saying that counting only thousands as beneficiaries in a population of millions of people would not augur well for the programme.

Rate of penetration and impact

“When the Minister was speaking, he was reeling out the figure of what they have done but when you look at a State with about 10 million population and we are saying only 1,000 or 2,000 people have benefitted, to me, this is terribly low. What I will therefore like to suggest is that if we can quickly increase our rate of penetration and impact, and the quantum of participants, it will be better.

“For instance, I like to see, with the level of commitment of the Minister and the Federal Government, that in Oyo State, we have impacted on one million or two million people, but when we are talking thousands in a population of about 10 million people, I am not feeling comfortable,” the Governor stated.

All the beneficiaries of the programme, including Mr. Afolabi Adedayo, Mrs Adebola Babalola commended President Jonathan saying their lives had been transformed through the programme.

Mrs. Babalola, who is in charge of general cleaning of the environment, said though N10,000 is very small as stipend, it helped her in the small scale agriculture that she embarked upon.