The Federal Government has secured the sum of $800 million from the World Bank under the National Social Investment Programme as part of palliatives to cushion the negative effects of the plan to remove subsidy on petroleum products by June 2023. The Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, Hajiya Zainab Ahmed, announced this Wednesday after the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the State House Abuja. “There’s a provision (of the Petroleum Industry Act) that says 18 months after the effectiveness of the PIA that all petroleum products must be deregulated. That 18 month takes us to June 2023.
“When we were working on the 2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework and the Appropriation Act, we made that provision to enable us to exit fuel subsidy by June 2023. We’re on course, we’re having different stakeholders’ engagements, and we’ve secured some funding from the World Bank, which is the first tranche of palliatives that will enable us to give cash transfers to the most vulnerable in our society that have now been registered in a national social register,” the minister said.
“Today that register has a list of 10 million households. Ten million households are equivalent to about 50 million Nigerians.”
When asked how much funding the FG received from the World Bank, the minister said “$800million for the scale-up of the National Social Investment Programme at the World Bank. And it’s been secured, it’s ready for disbursement”.
Ahmed explained that wide-ranging negotiations were underway to deploy non-cash palliatives such as a “mass transit” system for workers’ daily commute.
“So there are several things we’re still planning and working on, some we can start executing quickly, some are more medium-term implementation.
“There are a lot of discussions going on at different levels, including with members of the transition committee of the incoming government,’’ the minister added.
