Abia, UNICEF, ILO Target Functional Social Register
Boniface Okoro in Umuahia
Abia State Government has revealed that it is drafting a social protection bill for submission to the House of Assembly in September to guarantee the sustainability of social protection policies, interventions and programmes in the state.
One of the programmes the bill will give legal backing to is the ongoing 36-month EU-funded ‘Supporting Sustainable Social Protection Systems in Nigeria (SUSI)’ project. The project focuses on four key result areas: making the social register functional and expanding it to capture more poor and vulnerable households; improving the capacity of staff and policymakers through requisite training; developing a legal and policy framework with a social protection bill; and enhancing the social protection management information system across sectors.
Under the project, the state government is partnering with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) to build a functional social register already containing about 1.5 million individuals and over 240,000 poor and vulnerable households, train policymakers, and push for a social protection bill.
Speaking after the SUSI project engagement on June 17, 2026, in Umuahia, the state Commissioner for Poverty Alleviation and Social Protection, Mrs. Ngozi Blessing Felix, said Abia is one of four states selected for the project alongside Benue, Oyo and Sokoto States. She disclosed that the meeting focused on social protection implementation, financing, coordination, and administration.
Mrs. Felix said: “Abia is the only state in the Southeast and South-south part of Nigeria benefiting from the project. We are actually lucky to be one of the states selected.
“Today, we looked at one of the very key areas and objectives of the project — ensuring we have legal frameworks that support the sustainability of social protection, given that this is a programme meant to support the dignity of life for citizens, especially vulnerable citizens.
“To guarantee sustainability, it is critical to have a legal framework that outlives the current government and any political cycle.
“So today, we discussed how Abia State would commence the process of drafting a social protection bill.”
The commissioner explained that a complementary engagement had already been held with the Abia State House of Assembly, while work continues to finalize the state social protection policy.
On targeting beneficiaries, Felix said Abia State is updating and expanding its social register, which currently has “close to 1.5 million individuals and slightly over 240,000 households,” with the state poverty rate at about 31 percent.
Vulnerable persons, she said, are identified using 47 measures provided by the National Social Safety Net Coordination Office (NASCO). These include the aged, chronically ill, persons with disabilities, and those lacking employment, healthcare, or education.
Also, the state Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Ikechukwu Uwanna (SAN), said UNICEF, ILO, and the EU are providing technical support to ensure the bill is ready for the House by September 1, 2026, “to domesticate essentially what Section 17 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria provides-that there shall be social welfare for the citizens.”
The Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Prince Uzor Nwachukwu, said local government chairmen, traditional rulers, village heads and church leaders would help identify the truly poor at the community level to avoid nepotism. “The people will come as a community to choose those that should be affected by the programme… It’s not one person sitting down to write out a list,” he stated.
On his own, the Social Policy Manager, UNICEF, Zarema Yerzhanova, described social protection as “a major policy lever to deliver results not only for children, but ultimately to improve human capital development in the country and contribute to the economic and prosperous future of the nation.”
Yerzhanova commended Abia State for establishing a Social Protection Council and pledged continued engagement with the Ministry of Justice to advance legislative support, which she called “the core in any country to make social protection effective.”
Another UNICEF representative, Dr Victor Chima, explained that social protection is essentially social security — policies and programmes aimed at reducing and preventing poverty and vulnerability across the life cycle. “This includes benefits for children, families, maternity, unemployment, employment injury, sickness, old age, disability, survivors of all kinds of abuse, as well as health protection,” he said.
Also, the Head of the State Operations Coordinating Unit (SOCOU), Ezenwa Maduagwu, explained the process for generating data for the social register.
“We have Community-Based Targeting Teams-12 in number, divided into three teams, with six enumerators. They sensitize communities, engage stakeholders, share people into groups-men, women, the less privileged-and ask them because they know who among them is poor and vulnerable. After selecting, we do harmonization of the list,” he said.
The meeting drew critical stakeholders from relevant social protection implementing agencies and ministerial departments in the state.