President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration’s N50,000 monthly cash relief for vulnerable Nigerians, tagged National Emergency Relief and Stabilisation Intervention, NERSI, programme, has generated widespread reactions across the country over the past 24 hours.
Adding to the development, one of Nigeria’s leading fintech platforms, OPay, has clarified the eligibility requirements for beneficiaries of the Federal Government’s N50,000 monthly cash support following a statement released on Tuesday.
OPay, which recently halted plans for a $300 million initial public offering, IPO, on the New York Stock Exchange, said the much-discussed N50,000 relief payment was exclusively available to qualified vulnerable Nigerians.
The company made this clarification in a statement published on its official X account, explaining that customers who did not receive a notification on their apps were not eligible for the intervention.
It further stressed that it was not responsible for determining the eligibility of beneficiaries.
“The N50,000 monthly Federal Government cash support is available only to eligible citizens. Eligible customers will see a pop-up notification on their OPay app homepage. Kindly click on the pop-up to proceed with the next steps,” OPay stated.
The N50,000 monthly intervention, which could amount to billions of naira depending on the number of beneficiaries, has attracted both commendation and criticism, coming less than three months before the January 16, 2027, presidential election.
While some Nigerians have described the initiative as a potential electoral inducement, others have defended the intervention as necessary financial assistance amid the country’s worsening cost-of-living challenges.
Nigerian Newssphere reports that food inflation stood at 19.59 per cent in September 2026, reflecting the continued pressure on household spending, while headline inflation eased to 14.63 per cent, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Meanwhile, as Tinubu seeks re-election in 2027, he has promised to deliver greater economic prosperity under his administration.
However, presidential contenders under the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Nigeria Democratic Congress, NDC) and 15 other political parties have pledged to review some of the economic policies introduced by the current administration, including the removal of the petrol subsidy.
