Financing School feeding and  tradermoni, FG to spend N1.6bn

N1.6 billion has been allocated for the homegrown school feeding programme, Tradermoni, Farmermoni and Marketmoni in the 2023 appropriation budget which was presented by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) to the National Assembly last week Friday.

The projects which were described as “new”, were listed in the budget breakdown of the 2023 budget of the National Social Investment Office under the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management.

Though the agency did not specify the number of children it intends to feed nor the participants of its Tradermoni, Farmermoni and Marketmoni projects, our correspondent observed that the projects are part of the capital projects of the agency listed in the 2023 budget.

For the homegrown school feeding project, a sum of N1bn was appropriated while the sum of N600,000,000 was appropriated for Tradermoni, Farmermoni and Marketmoni.

The PUNCH reports that there has been a series of controversies over the school feeding programme and the Tradermoni projects which were commissioned by the Federal Government.

For instance, in October 2022, the Nassarawa State government noted that it uncovered 349 “ghost schools” which were included in the scheme for which money was disbursed.

In June 2022, the Federal Government announced its inability to recover the N10 billion Tradermoni funds disbursed under the first phase, three years after.

The Tradermoni is an interest-free loan given to traders, under the Government Enterprises and Empowerment Programme, which started in 2018, shortly before the 2019 general election.

(Punch)