Ministry debunks claim of N75b Youth Investment Fund Misappropriation
1.The Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development has had its attention drawn to a mischievous and ignorant allegation made by a discredited and self-acclaimed President of the National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN), which was circulated, syndicated and reported by some newspapers on the alleged misappropriation of 75billion Naira Nigeria Youth Investment Fund (NYIF) with no effort made to ascertain the facts.
2. For record there is no N75b released. Approval for NYIF was for N25b per annum for 3 years. 2021 is the first year and only 3B has been released and less than N2 billion disbursed as part of the ongoing process. Over 5,200 youth have benefited. The disbursement was handled solely by CBN and NIRSAL. Not a kobo was released to the account of the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports.
3.Names of the 5,200 beneficiaries can be found on the official website of the Ministry of Youth and Sports Development as published In June 2021. The names were also published in the Nation newspapers of June 21, 2021.
4. For the records, approval for NYIF was for N25 billion annually for 3 years, amounting to N75 billion. 2021 is the first year and less than N3 billion has been released.
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5. Under this first phase disbursed by the NIRSAL Microfinance Bank, 5,285 beneficiaries got soft loans with a total value of N1,661,370,000.00. The amount represents 55.38% of the N3 billion provided by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for the first phase.
6. The total number of undisbursed and unqualified applicants for the phase stood at 769 valued at N599,485,000.00. Of this numbers, 322 are yet to accept the loan offer, 26 failed NUBAN 149 failed payment, one (1) applicant rejected the loan offer and 587 are yet to apply for the loan via the NMFB loan application portal.
7. The Ministry had transparently declared that some applicants were not qualified for loan disbursement because they did not provide valid or correct contact details for communication on further steps in their application; applicant has existing AGSMEIS or COVID-19 Loan and that an applicant is older than 35 years old, which puts them beyond the age bracket for youth.
8. Other reasons are that the applicant has a poor credit rating or currently has a non-performing loan, applicant failed to provide a valid BVN and provided incomplete or incorrect BVN. This information is in the public domain.
9. Beneficiaries and applicants have been consistently reminded that the Nigeria Youth Investment Fund (NYIF) disburses repayable loans to the youth and not grants.
10. It is unfortunate that the 36-year so-called Solomon Adodo ignored the well-publicized information about the NYIF and opted to mislead the media organizations that published his lies. The period during when he was remanded in Suleja Correctional Centre for impersonating the NYCN President was not prolonged enough for him to have missed the publication of these facts.
