Special Adviser to the President on Social Investment, Mrs Maryam Uwais, has responded to allegations by wife of the president, Mrs Aisha Buhari, that implementation of Social Investment Programmes (SIP) failed in the North.

Uwais, who spoke on a Lagos-based televison station on Monday, said the programme had, out of the 4.2 million

indigenes, reached out directly to, at least, 290,000 beneficiaries in 12 local governments of Adamawa State.

The presidential aide said, had Mrs Buhari bothered to go through SIP data, she would have seen that 1,054 primary schools have been captured in the school feeding programme, 11,000 graduates have been recruited and are working in every local government in Aisha’s home state, as well as 440 non-graduates engaged by the programme.

She said: “I believe that if she were to listen to the information that is out there, if she were to check on our data, she would have been able to track all the beneficiaries. I’m saying that we have over 11,000 graduates that had been recruited and are working in every local government in her home state.

“We have non-graduates 440, we started the School Feeding Programme in October 2018, we are in 1,054 in primary

schools. We have only scratched the surface in the sense that we don’t have the sufficient funding to address.

“We have, by our own data, at least 4.2 million indigenes of Adamawa state and, if we have done about 300,000 directly, I believe we could do so much more if we had sufficient funding.

“So, I’m saying that, yes, she may not have met them but the truth is we are there; we are in 12 local governments for

the cash transfers and we are in 12 local governments also for the loans. We have, at least, 290,000 beneficiaries directly that we are paying in Adamawa state.”

The president’s wife, had, at an interactive programme for women at the State House, Abuja, last week, said despite that she was assured that 30,000 women would benefit from the programme, from Adamawa, she was yet to see anything as the administration winds down.

“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 met Barrister (one of the president’s 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 (last

weekend) I haven’t heard from him…”

Sun