THE Special Adviser to Ondo State Governor on Public and Inter-governmental Relations, Mrs Olubunmi Ademosu, on Saturday said the Home Grown School Feeding Programme, would resume in the state next week.
Ademosu who stated this while speaking to newsmen on the suspension of the programme said the development was as a result of discrepancies in the information submitted by the food vendors.
According to her, many of the cooks engaged for the programme did not have bank accounts before they registered for the programme but hurriedly opened bank accounts without genuine Bank Verification Numbers (BVN)
The Special Adviser noted that many of the names submitted by the food vendors did not tally with their BVN, and made it difficult in crediting their accounts.
Ademosu emphasised that most of the cooks are not high-tech caterers in line with the decision of the government to ensure that the programme does not only provide food for school children but also serve as an empowerment platform for the people.
She however said, the agency monitoring the programme in Abuja discovered “that apart from giving wrong information about themselves, investigations revealed that many of the vendors had plans to sublet the job for people that were not medically and professionally certified for the programme.”
She explained that the Home Grown School Feeding programme was carefully designed in a way that resources allocated for the success of the programme are not diverted, hence the direct crediting of the accounts of the over 1,000 cooks engaged for the programme.
The Special Adviser whose office coordinates the school feeding programme said about 78,000 pupils were already being fed in the state with the target to touch over 100,000 pupils across the three senatorial districts.
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She added that the agency discovered that about 95 per cent of pupils in Akoko area of the state were not benefitting from the programme when it took off in the state but said arrangements are ongoing to ensure that the programme was put in place in the area and not politicised
She also said about 90 per cent of the vendors have now rectified their accounts and hopefully, the right vendors will be credited by Monday, next week and the programme will commence immediately.
She said “Over 80 per cent of the vendors have now complied fully and their details uploaded now.
The slight hitch is not only peculiar to Ondo State but other states. Hopefully, by Monday, the accounts of the vendors will be credited and the programme will commence”,
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