FG feeds 800,000 Kaduna pupils

Th e federal government’ s Home Grown School Feeding Programme had begun in Kaduna state on July 25, a director in the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, John Gora, has disclosed. Gora, who oversees the programme, told the News Agency of Nigeria yesterday in Kaduna that about 800,000 pupils would be fed at N70 per meal. According to him, the government will spend about N56 million daily, N280 million a week and N1.1 billion every month in feeding pupils. Th e director said out of the 20,146 vendors shortlisted for the programme, only 9,000 would participate. “Based on the arrangement, the federal government will feed primary one to three pupils, while the state government will feed primary four to six pupils. “However, if you remember, in 2016, when the programme was implemented in the state, the state government fed all the pupils from primary one to primary six at the cost of over N10 billion.

“It shouldered the responsibility of the federal government on the agreement that the federal government would refund to the state the amount it spent on feeding primary one to three pupils. Th e amount was about seven billion and so far, the federal government has refunded N3.5 billion to the state.’’ Gora said as soon as the federal government refunded the remaining balance, the state would commence the feeding of primary 4-6 pupils. He said the 20, 146 vendors were supposed to provide services to both the state and the federal government components. “So far, only 9000 vendor accounts have been verifi ed, while the remaining vendors are being processed. I am sure we will complete the verifi cation process before the state government’s component comes on stream,” the director said. He acknowledged that the programme was however experiencing some challenges. “From the report on my table, some vendors were posted to diff erent communities, far away from home and this is a problem for us.”

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