As the 774,000 jobs kick off – Vanguard

PERHAPS the most ambitious mass-employment programme in the history of this country has just kicked off. The tweet by the Federal Government on Tuesday, July 14, 2020 that the programme had started effectively overrode the earlier purported suspension of the Special Public Works, SPW, which the Joint Committee of the National Assembly on Labour had ordered after a meeting with the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, ended in chaos.

The SPW programme, which seeks to employ 1,000 youths from each of the 774 Local Government Areas of the Federation is an intervention programme aimed at stimulating the economy at the grassroots to help address the mass unemployment that the coronavirus pandemic has worsened.

It will focus mainly on agriculture and its value chains.

We commend President Buhari and the Ministry of Labour and Employment for their commitment to this programme which is evident in the auspicious manner with which it has been followed so far. The nation would have lost an opportunity to react effectively to the fallouts of the pandemic if the project had been mired in the disagreement between the Executive and the National Assembly.

The National Assembly had acted overbearingly on this issue. The fine line must be drawn between the oversight function of the Legislature and actually seeking to supervise the activities of the Executive. The principle of separation of powers and checks and balances require that while both chambers stay within their constitutional limits, they must work together to maximise the output and impact of governance.

We believe that the Inter-ministerial Committee which Keyamo set up to select the state implementation panels should be able to ensure that the prevalent miasma of nepotism will not be allowed to creep into the selection of the beneficiaries. The National Assembly should still continue to monitor this aspect to ensure equitable distribution of beneficiaries.

Since the Minister of State, Labour, Mr. Festus Keyamo cited the need to keep the public properly informed of the way the programme is implemented as his reason for refusing to be part of a process that kept out the media and public from the contentious public hearing at the National Assembly, the onus is now on him to frequently inform the public on progress made, perhaps on a weekly basis. The media must be carried along.

We also call on the Ministry to ensure that the beneficiaries are the real youth who are ready to apply their brains and brawns productively, and not just political jobbers targeting the N20,000 monthly stipend. The beneficiaries must be based in the local communities within each local government area. They must be verifiably involved in agriculture and related business activities within their local communities.

Productivity monitoring is key in this programme.

VANGUARD

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As the 774,000 jobs kick off - Vanguard