Over 1000 persons who applied for jobs under the Nation Builder’s Corps (NaBCo) have applied to opt out of the programme introduced by government as part of the measures to solve graduate unemployment in the country.

Government announced Sunday that 1,098 beneficiaries have since October 2018 notified the NaBCo secretariat of their decision to exit to other employment schemes but did not give details which those schemes are.

“These voluntary exits are expected to continue as government continues to recruit into the public services,” Information Minister Kojo Oppong Nkrumah stated.

The development, he said would “create more vacancies” on the NaBCo’s roll, because it will give the secretariat room to employ persons who were recruited but were placed on a waiting list.

He explained government foresaw the situation, and that it was in view of that “others were left on a waiting list”

“Those on this waiting list who have not been placed may be placed as vacancies open up based on the aforementioned reasons. Being on the waiting list or even being placed does not mean a beneficiary is bonded as some have speculated,” he added.

He explained further that entry onto and exit from the programme is purely voluntary.

Meanwhile, he asked beneficiaries who desire to stay on the waiting list to indicate same on the NaBCo recruitment platform online.

Payment of allowance this week

On the issue of stipend, the Information Minister said funds for the programme were duly catered for in the 2018 budget, noting payments of stipends have commenced for some 77,907 beneficiaries.

However, he said 18,001 beneficiaries did not receive their stipends for various reasons, indicating that the secretariat encountered some problems which required that they halted the processing of allowance until some data were corrected.

According to him, messages were sent to the beneficiaries to correct their data for re-entry into the NaBCo system.

“The secretariat informs us that 9,235 of them have now corrected their data and thus will be paid this week. Their December and regular stipends are also programmed to be paid immediately afterward,” he said.

Again, he said another 8,766 still have outstanding data issues and are encouraged to correct their data as requested of them in messages sent to them so they can be paid as soon as possible.

‘Illegal’ beneficiaries

The Minister also revealed that 2,105 beneficiaries were found to be already employed by other government programmes such as YEA, NSS, Forestry Commission, MoH Nursing Training Institution or already employed in other sectors.

“The Secretariat informs us that such persons will be exited from the programme” he stated.