The National Cash Transfer Office (NCTO) says the introduction of the Federal Government digitalized payment system for beneficiaries of cash transfer will revolutionize and enhance effective implementation of the program in the country.
The Interim Head, National Cash Transfer Office (NCTO), Dr Ibraheem Adam, made this known in an interview on Friday in Abuja.
Adam, who attended a virtual International Conference recently, said the digitization was going to open up the reach of those in the rural areas so as to find economic activities thriving for them.
According to him, people can now do transactions freely, so this is another financial subway created for beneficiaries by making payment anywhere and by so doing will help in revolutionizing the program in Nigeria.
“Before now, we have a process in place that is electronic and trackable to the last mile but government felt to go further because in the initial arrangement, the Payment Service Provider (PSP), some of which are mobile money operators, micro finance banks, have credible processes.
“They have national reach by creating a temporary wallet that once payment is done, it’s been discarded.
“But with this digitization, each beneficiary now have a permanent NUBAN account with a bank and this accounts besides the purpose of our program can be used for other beneficiary purposes.
“We also have a process in place when this money goes into the account after crediting, will be able to print debit cards for these beneficiaries which provides them access to their funds either in the banking hall, at the ATM point or the POS,” he said.
He commended President Muhammadu Buhari and the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Hajiya Sadiya Farouq, for the initiative at reducing the poverty level in the country.
Adam added that majority of the beneficiaries who reside in the rural areas found POS as the most appealing.
He said that the office realised the deficit of financial infrastructure in the rural areas, hence has been able to aid the POS network agents in those areas to move so that they could provide these funds available for the beneficiaries.
He, therefore, said that the office was already talking with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the e-Naira platform to ease payments for the beneficiaries.
