The Executive Director of the Centre for Human Rights and Accountability Network (CHRAN), Franklyn Isong, has warned the Akwa Ibom State Government against allowing its proposed ₦31 billion economic empowerment programme to become a tool for political patronage.
Isong said the success of the initiative would depend largely on how beneficiaries were selected and verified, stressing that the fund was intended to cushion economic hardship and should therefore be accessible to deserving residents regardless of political affiliation.
Speaking on Passion FM, he commended Governor Umo Eno for initiating the programme but cautioned against placing the funds entirely under a government ministry or agency without an independent oversight mechanism.
According to him, there was a risk that beneficiaries could be selected based on political connections rather than genuine economic needs if adequate safeguards were not put in place.
“If you are giving a farmer an empowerment into his farm, have you gone to see his farm? Does he even have a farm?” Isong asked, stressing the need for physical verification before government funds were released.
He cited the AK-CARES programme as an example of the challenges that could arise when beneficiary selection and monitoring were not sufficiently transparent. Isong said that despite the billions of naira reportedly committed to the programme, there were still concerns over the identities and status of its actual beneficiaries.
He questioned the continued reliance on old beneficiary lists, noting that some people on such databases could have died, relocated or otherwise become ineligible for assistance.
“Some of them must have died. Some of them must have migrated for that list to become richer than being there,” he said.
Isong consequently urged the state government to introduce a transparent verification and monitoring system for the ₦31 billion programme, involving civil society organisations, labour unions and the academia, among others, to ensure that the intervention reaches genuine beneficiaries and produces measurable economic impact.
