Niger State Governor Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu has announced that plans are underway by his government to set up a social security scheme to cater for the physically challenged and destitute in the state.
The governor who made this known at a workshop on street begging and the launching of the compendium of law reform commission, expressed hope that the move would curb street begging and its attendant social risks in the state.
He revealed that feeding centers would be set up in the state, and added that the beneficiaries might have to pay a meager amount of money to have access to the facility when established.
The governor said that all the beneficiaries within the school age would be encouraged to go to school for both Islamic and western education and that the Ministry of Gender Affairs had been directed to work out the modalities for the quick take off of the social security scheme .
“I will not be afraid to take harsh and hard decision, Islam is not about begging, we will stop people from misinterpreting the Quran” he said.
Aliyu explained that the tenets of Islam kicked against anything that would bring down the esteem of anybody in the eyes of others, for this reason, his government would move against street begging.
He said that government had the responsibility to protect the esteem of everybody by doing everything possible to ensure that poverty is alleviated and removing all barriers to actualizing self esteem.
According to him the National Bureau of Statistics’ latest report which placed the state first among the states with the least poverty level in the country, was as a result of the implementations of the MDGs and Ward Development Programmes.