The National Economic Council (NEC) have reportedly reaffirmed that it is planning to engage N-Power beneficiaries and National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members in community policing.
This was made known in a statement from the office of the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo on Thursday night.
According to the release, the governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, presented an update on the NEC ad-hoc committee set up on security and policing.
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Fayemi said the Inspector General of Police (IGP) has initiated the commencement of community policing.
”The Inspector General of Police (IGP) has initiated the commencement of community policing and there is a plan to consider using N-Power beneficiaries and youth corpers as police officers in their local government areas,” the information reads.
Also, the statement indicated that a full report will be given in the next NEC meeting.
While addressing them, President Muhammadu Buhari urged the council to pay special attention to security, education, agriculture and health.
He said his administration was committed to protecting Nigeria’s territory and urged the governors to find ways of increasing their state’s internal revenue.
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The Federal Government and the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) had in July proposed to convert NYSC members and beneficiaries of the N-Power scheme to beef up the manpower needs of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF).
The N-Power volunteers and the ‘corpers’, if the policy is approved, are to be added to the extra 10,000 additional hands being recruited by the police.
Vice president prof. Yemi Osinbajo presided over NEC meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Thursday.
The country’s number two citizen, who chairs the NEC, is the head of Nigeria’s Economic Management team.
The meeting – held monthly – comes on the heels of the inauguration of new ministers by President Buhari on Wednesday.
The N-Power programme is designed to assist young Nigerians between the ages of 18 to 35 to acquire and develop life-long skills for becoming change makers in their communities and players in the domestic and global markets and given a stipend of N30,000 monthly.
Billions of naira have been spent on the N-Power programme since its inception in December 2016.
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The scheme currently engages no fewer than 500,000 youth graduates deployed to provide public health services in teaching, health, agriculture and tax and monitoring.
It also engages another 200,000 non-graduates in training or on attachment to organisations as interns.
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