Lockdown: N-Power beneficiaries lament non-payment of March stipend

Beneficiaries of the N-Power scheme under the National Social Investment Programme (NSIP) have appealed to the Federal Government to pay their stipends for March 2020 to assist them in cushioning the effect of the lockdown ordered to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in the country.

Rakiya Aminu, a primary school teacher, who made this appeal in an interview with our correspondent in Birnin Kebbi yesterday, urged the Federal Government to pay their stipends to enable them buy food.

She said, “It is shameful and extremely painful that at a time governments in civilised countries are dolling out palliatives to citizens under lockdown, our government has held unto our March stipends without any explanation, whatsoever.

“Those of us on N-Power are posted to primary schools with more than a 100 pupils in a class and we carry out our duties diligently, even under the most unfavourable conditions. Yet we are being unfairly treated because our stipends are paid halfway into the next month or sometimes even owed for two months,” she said.

Aminu noted that the whole country was under total or partial lockdown and they remained unpaid.