FG raises alarm over fake N-Power portals and links

 

The National Social Investment Office (NSIO) Wednesday urged Nigerians, particularly N- Power beneficiaries, to discountenance fake online messages put out from “fake portals and links” purported to belong to it.

This is just as the Special Adviser to the President on Social Investment, Maryam Uwais, said the Federal Government was in the process of building a National Social Register NSR, which contains a comprehensive and reliable database of poor and vulnerable households across the country.

She said the NSR which can be disaggregated into age, gender, disability, educational levels, etc, for proper planning of social intervention programmes at the national, state and Local Government levels, would also be available for third parties who intend to utilise the information therein for research and philanthropic activities.

In a statement, the Communications Manager, Justice Bibiye, said the agency had identified fake portals and links which were being used “to deceive unsuspecting individuals into applying for a fresh batch of N-Power volunteers or N.Power devices via the fabricated links on the social media.”

Bibiye described all such messages as “the handiwork of fraudsters who would stop at nothing to employ dubious means of ripping innocent people of their hard earned resources”.

“We wish to state categorically that the Federal Government has yet to commence the distribution of devices to Batch B, N-Power beneficiaries. Indeed, the process has commenced and all beneficiaries would be duly informed via the N-Power website or other verified social media contacts of the NSIO, when the devices are available,” she said.

The agency revealed that there were 1,349,517 poor and vulnerable households, comprising 5,483,531 individuals captured on the National Social Register NSR, across 32 States, as at September, 2019, while the process for enumeration and identification has commenced in the remaining States and at various stages of completion.

“ We are also engaged in collating information relating to nearest primary and secondary schools, payment service providers, primary healthcare agencies, access roads, power and network reception, in all the communities it engages”

Uwais, who harped on the need for Nigeria to leverage on the huge successes recorded so far in the execution of the SIPs to effectively wage the war on poverty in the country for rapid economic growth, said plans were underway to sustain the programme which had given a new lease of life to millions of poor and vulnerable Nigerians.

“A draft law has been prepared along with a 5-year Road Map, which documents are being considered before finalization.

Efforts are also underway to explore feasible sources of funding, for a sustained and concerted impact to ensure the strategic reduction of poverty and unemployment, within the constraints of restricted funding and unlimited population growth,” according to the agency.