The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has been invited to probe massive fraud in the Social Investments Programme (SIP).

This was even as government said only 15 percent of the N1 trillion budgeted for the programme in two years, has been released.

Special Adviser to the President on Social Investments Programme, Mrs. Maryam Uwais, disclosed this when she briefed State House Correspondents on her presentation to the National Economic Council (NEC) meeting chaired by Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, at the Presidential Villa, yesterday.

She said 7,812,201 Nigerians are direct beneficiaries of the programme which includes home-grownschool feeding programme, conditional cash transfer, N-Power, while secondary beneficiaries-mainly farmers and cooks-are about 1,500,000.

According to Uwais, the total actual spending on SIP in 2016 and 2017 was just 15.58 percent of the budget.

Half a trillion naira had been budgeted for each of the two years, which means that only N158 billion had been released and spent.

She however, disclosed that challenges encountered so far had been corrupt practices in the states, such as short-changing, racketeering and harassment of beneficiaries; exploitation of the vulnerable, due to poor levels of literacy, as well as insufficient awareness/publicity and logistics for monitoring the programme.

Uwais said while the SIP is collaborating with various organisations within and outside government, to overcome the challenges, participating state governments are required to support in fraud detection and prevention by their local officials; loan recovery from beneficiaries as well as mobilisation and facilitating the generation of BVN and the opening of accounts.

She said some officials siphoned money to illegal bank accounts, which is why the EFCC has been notified, to apprehend and prosecute the officials, some of whom have been suspended or sacked. (Daily Sun)