The federal government has resumed the payment of N5,000 monthly stipend to 12,337 poor and vulnerable households through digital means in Ondo.

Tosin Olupona, head of the CCT office in Ondo, disclosed this in an interview on Monday in Akure.

The CCT programme is part of the National Social Investment Programmes (NSIP).

According to Ms Olupona, the backlog has been lodged on each of the beneficiaries’ new debit card accounts that will be accessed through payment agents in their communities.

She revealed that the benefiting families were from 15 local government areas out of the 18 local governments in the state. Ms Olopona attributed the delay in payment to operational issues, adding that the backlog payment was from six to 20 months, depending on when the beneficiary joined the scheme.

“We are here because we have just commenced payment of backlogs of stipends of our beneficiaries; this is victory at last because you can see that everyone is happy, collecting their money,” the CCT official stated. “We have a backlog of between six months and 20 months, and they have been agitating to collect their money and we have been moving from one local government to another to pay them.”

She stressed that the delay resulted from an operational issue which “is not our fault.” 

“I think it affected four states that are having this operational issue, but it has been resolved now, so, that’s why we are paying them,” she said.

(NAN)