NAPEP: A TRI-CAUSAL EXPLANATION OF WHY IT FAILED

Abstract

National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP)—the flagship of Nigeria's efforts to realize the UN's millennium development goal on extreme poverty and hunger—coordinated federal government-funded poverty reduction projects from 2001 to 2014.It replaced Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP) which had been created in 2000.The appellative shift from “poverty alleviation” to “poverty eradication” must have created an illusion of renewed determination to reduce the country's hunger and poverty statistics. NAPEP was generously funded; still it failed to be recognizably different from its predecessors. In fact, the number of Nigerians who slipped into poverty during its years increased rather than decreased. The paper discusses the three main reasons for the failure, namely broad-based approach (universalism), state capture (corruption) and beneficiary exclusion. Its goal is to problematize poverty reduction efforts in developing countries.