NABCo recruits cry over unpaid allowances

A group of Nation Builders Corps (NABCo) recruits are protesting the delay in payment of their allowances.

The group who earlier massed up at the NABCo secretariat are meeting with officials to resolve the challenges with regards to the payment of their allowances.

Some of the NABCO recruits who spoke to Citi News expressed the frustration at the delay in the payment of the allowances despite meeting all the validation requirements.

“Until they pay us, we are not leaving the NABCo premises. When you go there, they tell you the money will come meanwhile they are paying our colleagues. The most painful aspect of it is that those who are at home and have not received placement yet, they have been paid but those of us who are on the field and actually working have not been paid,” one of the recruits said.

Another one also said he had evidence that he had met all the requirements for payment but is yet to receive his allowance for the previous month.

“Evidence is here that I have updated my information. They sent me a text message to confirm that I have updated my information and so I should expect payment. I have the signatures of the coordinators but [the payment] is yet to come.”

In January 2019, some NABCo recruits complained that they had not received their allowances since the program begun.

The Minister for Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah said the delay in the payment was due to inaccurate data on the payroll.

He said the affected persons must update their information before they can receive payment.

“NABCO secretariat sent messages to beneficiaries to correct their data for it to be rekeyed into the system. The Secretariat informs us that 9,235 of them have now corrected their data and thus will be paid this week. Their December and regular stipends are also programmed to be paid immediately afterwards,” he said.

He said some of them had been forcefully removed from the program because they had been found to have enrolled unto other government programs.

Akufo-Addo commissions NABCO recruits

President Nana Akufo-Addo in October 2018 commissioned the passing out ceremony for 100,000 beneficiaries under NABCO modules which include Feed Ghana, Educate Ghana, Revenue Ghana, Heal Ghana, Enterprise Ghana, Digitise Ghana and Governance Ghana.

The National Coordinator of NABCo, Ibrahim Anyass, assured that the programme was not a duplication of other youth employment schemes like the Youth Employment Agency (YEA).

President Nana Akufo-Addo at the passing out ceremony admonished the recruits not to consider the GHc700 stipend as free money but should work hard to earn it.

“You must bear in mind that government is investing some GH¢3 billion cedis of taxpayers’ money into this programme. Your monthly GH¢700 is not free money, and you must earn every pesewa of it which I’m confident you’ll do,” he said.

Create a legal framework to keep NaBCo on track – Minority

The Minority in Parliament is demanding a legal framework to guide the implementation of the government’s Nation Builders’ Corps (NABCo) programme.

According to the Minority Leader, Haruna Idrissu, the government must learn from previous experiences with such schemes that did not have legal backing and veered from their core mandates.

NABCO will succeed – Nana Addo tells critics

Following enormous criticism of the NABCO initiative, President Akufo-Addo at the passing out ceremony hit back at critics who downplayed the impact of the NABCo insisting that the programme will go a long way to partly address the current unemployment situation in the country.

He was also optimistic the country will benefit from the talents of the NABCo graduates.

“As has become the norm with every bold initiative proposed by this administration, this programme, predictably, was not only ridiculed in certain quarters but also met with pessimistic and cynical comments with some going to the extent of urging graduates from our nations tertiary institutions not to register for the programme. In NABCO, we have planted the seeds of growth and future of our country. I am in no doubt whatsoever that NABCO will succeed,” he added.