The Nigerian Government has commenced biometric data capture of 560,000 pupils from 2,632 primary schools benefitting from the National Home Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP) in Niger.

Hajiya Fatima Bisallah, Team Leader for the enumeration from the Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management, disclosed this in Minna on Wednesday.

The NHGSFP is a Federal Government-led N70 per day school feeding programme aimed at improving the health and educational status of public school pupils.

Bisallah said the exercise was a physical verification to capture and get accurate biometric data of pupils and cooks in the state to scale up the programme to include more pupils.

“The exercise is to know the exact figure of the pupils benefitting from the programme as well as have their data base to enable us scale up the number of pupils,” she said.

She said the ministry was collaborating with the National Orientation Agency (NOA) and the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) for the data capture.

She added that the security challenges in part of the state would not hinder the exercise as appropriate measures had been put in place to cover the no-go-areas.

Also speaking, Malam Hamza Audu, the Director of NOA in Niger, said the agency has fully sensitised stakeholders and communities to ensure the success of the exercise.

Amina Gu’ar, Focal Person of Social Investment Programme (SIP) in Niger, expressed satisfaction with the quality of food being served to pupils by the vendors.

She said that about 560,000 pupils were benefitting from the programme in the state with over 5,000 food vendors engaged by the government.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed stated in a briefing at the State House on Wednesday that the Twitter ban in Nigeria will be lifted soon.

Speaking to the State correspondents at the end of the virtual Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo at the First Lady’s Conference room, Presidential Villa, Abuja, The Minister who was asked to give update on the Twitter ban in Nigeria and the interface with the company said, “The end for amicable resolution is very much in sight.

‘We appreciate the patience of Nigerians. I want to assure you that we have made very tremendous progress. We have met with Twitter both physically and in writing. We are actually almost there.

” The engagement has been extremely positive without any acrimony. We have made it clear what we want from Twitter.”

Alhaji Mohammed stated that some of the conditions made by the Federal Government for Twitter operations to resume in Nigeria include that Twitter should establish legal presence in the country, register as a Nigerian company with an address.

It should also have a Country Representative that will serve as a liaison and must register with relevant regulatory agencies including the NCC.

The government is also demanding that Twitter must commit itself to the Federal Inland Revenue Service, FIRS. Also, the government is proposing an Ombudsman between Twitter and Nigeria.

“They (Twitter) have shown a lot of flexibility, the conversation has not been acrimonious,” Mohammed said.

He, however said that there were about three to four areas the two were yet to reach agreement which include opening of office in Nigeria with staff, adding that Twitter has agreed to open office in the country in 2022.