The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs Zainab Ahmed, has met with the NASS leadership led by Senator Lawan to formally inform them of an Executive proposal to establish a N500 billion COVID-19 Crisis Intervention Fund.
She said the proposed fund would be dedicated to upgrading of existing health facilities in states across the federation.
The Fund would also be deployed to take care of special Public Work Programmes currently being implemented by the National Directorate of Employment(NDE).
She said: “What we are proposing is an establishment of a N500 billion COVID-19 Crisis Intervention Fund,” the minister told the parliamentary leaders.
This fund that we are proposing, that should be created, will involve mopping up resources from various special accounts that the government, as well as the Federation, have, to be able to pull this N500 billion.
“Our general view is that this crisis intervention fund is to be utilised to upgrade healthcare facilities as earlier identified.
In her presentation, the Minister of Finance said the N500 billion COVID-19 Fund being proposed would be pooled from various special accounts, grants being expected and loans from multilateral institutions.
