The Federal Government says it has disbursed more than ₦600 billion in cash transfers to vulnerable Nigerians over the past three years as part of efforts to cushion the economic effects of fuel subsidy removal.
Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction, Bernard Doro, disclosed the figure during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday.
Doro said the intervention had reached slightly more than 10 million households, revising upward the figure contained in some earlier reports that put the number of beneficiaries at just over nine million.
“We’ve done over 600 billion in cash transfers to be able to support vulnerable Nigerians within three years. We have reached slightly over 10 million households,” the minister said.
The disclosure comes as the Federal Government faces continued pressure over the impact of the removal of petrol subsidy, particularly the rise in transportation, food and household costs.
The Tinubu administration has repeatedly argued that subsidy removal freed resources that can be redirected towards social protection, infrastructure and other public programmes.
The government has also recently launched a $1 billion social protection programme aimed at moving vulnerable Nigerians beyond temporary relief measures and towards longer-term economic empowerment and self-reliance.
The initiative is part of a broader attempt by the administration to respond to concerns over the cost-of-living crisis while maintaining its position that the old petrol subsidy regime was financially unsustainable.
However, questions remain over the reach, transparency and effectiveness of government interventions, particularly whether cash transfers and other social programmes are sufficiently reaching households facing the greatest pressure.
The latest figures therefore place the government’s social protection programme at the centre of the continuing debate over whether the economic reforms introduced under Tinubu are adequately compensating Nigerians for their immediate costs.