Acting President Yemi Osinbajo has directed that online portal of the Federal Government’s job initiative, N-Power, be re-opened on June 17.

Minister of State, Budget and Planning, Zainab Ahmed disclosed this on Tuesday in Abuja.

Ahmed said the Federal Government will ensure the programme accommodates more beneficiaries this year, while applying youths to apply for the programme.

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She said the government’s National Social Investment Programme (N-SIP) has so far empowered over 1.6 million Nigerians.

“For example, in N-Power Scheme that 200,000 beneficiaries have been employed, we are supposed to increase it to 500,000 beneficiaries in 2017,” the minister said.

“There is opportunity in the N-Power Programme for employment. There is opportunity in the GEEP for you to get finances to be able to start businesses. Please, this is real, it is working, join the process and be a beneficiary,’’ she added.

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According to her, the programme has not attained its set target because of the delay in starting its actual implementation.

“The deployment, release of funds didn’t start till October 2016; and it is so because we want to make sure that the programme is planned properly.

“We want to make sure that each beneficiary has bank account linked to BVN; we are targeting the right people, not just people nominated by big people.

“That took a lot of time, but we thank God that the programme is going on well and it is now easier to upscale it,’’ she explained.