About 500
successful applicants of the Federal Government’s N-POWER scheme in
Lagos on Tuesday stormed the State House of Assembly, seeking
intervention on their deployment and payment.
News Agency of
Nigeria (NAN) reports that youths who applied to be captured in the
scheme had earlier staged a protest at the Assembly premises in January.
They
had complained that successful applicants in other states had started
enjoying the scheme while they were still in the dark about when it
would begin in Lagos.
The House had taken up the matter by
inviting the State Coordinator of the scheme Mrs Shola Falana and the
State Commissioner for Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Mrs Lola
Akande for explanations.
Honouring the invitation, Falana had
assured the House that applicants from the state would begin to benefit
from the scheme by the end of January.
She attributed the delay
in the take-off of the scheme in Lagos to the volume of applicants from
the state, numbering about 11, 000.
However, protesters returned
on Tuesday chanting songs and displaying placards with various
inscriptions to drive home their grievances.
The placards had
inscriptions such as: “Lagos State N-Power volunteers are tired of
staying at home” and “Only Lagos State N-Power are excluded from the
programme, attend to us”,
Others read “Release our stipends” and “Enough!!!, No information , No device, No deployment, No stipends,”
Edited from Daily Trust