by ‘Jola Sotubo

Nigeria might soon follow the footsteps of developed countries who give allowances to the unemployed if a recommendation given to that effect at the ongoing National Conference is accepted by the Federal Government.

The move is said to have been suggested by the Committee on Law, Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Reform at the Confab.

Members of the committee urged the government to pay unemployed graduates the same allowance that is given to members of the National Youth Service Corps.

Currently, youth corpers around the country are being paid a stipend of N19,800 monthly.

Punch reports:

A member of the committee said the recommendation was one of the ways the committee members felt that crime could be reduced in the country.

Apart from that, the source said the members felt that the action would force the Federal Government to be alive to its responsibility of providing welfare to its citizens.

The committee member, who asked not to be named, said, “The recommendation is our own way of finding solutions to the rising wave of crime in the country and to also force the government to do the needful for the increasing number of unemployed graduates in the country.

“We have done our part and it is left for the delegates to either reject or accept it at plenary.”

Meanwhile, after three weeks of intensive committee work, the plenary session of the National Conference resumes on Monday (today) in Abuja with commencement of the consideration of reports of the 20 committees assigned to handle critical national issues.

While some of the committees had already submitted signed copies of their reports with agreed-upon recommendations to the conference secretariat for distribution to delegates, others, as at Sunday, were still busy with the collation of their final reports.

It would be recalled that at specific times within the three weeks, the committees’ leadership met with the conference management, comprising the Chairman, Deputy Chairman, the Secretary and the three assistant secretaries to rub minds on certain issues to facilitate their work.

It was during one of those meetings that the issue of time extension for committees, from two to three weeks, was discussed, agreed upon and implemented in view of the workload assigned each of the committees and the various national public holidays that followed.

Submission of Committee Reports to the Conference is in line with Order 12(d-e) of the National Conference Procedure Rules 2014, which states that, “Each Committee shall submit to the Conference the report of its activities.