In what appeared to be an indictment of the Federal Government Social Investment Programme, SIP, wife of the President, Dr. Aisha Buhari on Saturday said that the programme meant to help the poorest of the poor has not yielded the required results in the north.
The President’s wife stated this at an interactive programme for women at the Presidential villa, Abuja. She disclosed that she was assured that 30,000 women will benefit from the programme from Adamawa but as the administration winds down, she was yet to hear from them. The Social Investment Programme is under the control of Mrs. Maryam Uwais, who is the Special Adviser to the President. According to her: “Concerning the N500 billion voted for SIP, that was part of 2015 campaigns where they promised to give out N10,000, feed pupils in primary schools and give N5,000 to the poorest of the poorer.
“The SSA to the president on social investment is a lady from Kano and I’m sure that my husband decided to put somebody from Kano because of the population and political impact it made. “I have never asked how the money is being used or is being given out. I met Barrister (one of the President aides on SIP) once and he promised me that for my state (Adamawa) we should get 30,000 women to be given N10,000. Up till now I haven’t heard from him. “I don’t want to raise alarm that my state do not benefit from it, where SGF came from, I kept quiet because I don’t want people to say that I talk too much. “Recently I saw a 74-year-old man selling petty things in Kano, I asked him how much is his capital, he told me between N3,000 and N4,000. Don’t forget that we have campaigned to give the poorest of the poor, N5,000 every month .. “So I don’t know where the social investment… Maybe, It worked out in some states. In my own state, only a local government benefited out of the 22. I didn’t ask what happened and I don’t want to know but for it fail woefully in Kano, it’s not a good sign and it’s not a good thing. “We have a lot of women that do business locally due to the cultural thing in the north, that are at home doing their businesses. Some are millionaires, some have thousands of naira, they need the assistance but they do not get it. Most northern women do not belong to any market association.
