LEAP Beneficiaries to access cash through e-zwich

Beneficiaries of the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) programme can now access their social cash grant electronically through e-zwich platform.

This forms part of a nationwide enrollment exercise for all LEAP beneficiaries onto the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPPS) Electronic – Payment (E-Payment) platform from 10th to 24th March, 2016 in all LEAP districts nationwide.

The enrollment exercise is aimed at capturing the biometric data of beneficiaries to facilitate cash grant transfer electronically.

The LEAP programme is cash transfer being implemented by the Department of Social Welfare under the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection ( MOGCSP), aimed at reducing poverty by increasing consumption and promoting access to services and opportunities among the extreme poor and vulnerable households, elderly persons 65 years and above without any support and severely disabled persons without any productive capacity and recently, the extremely poor pregnant women and children under 2 years old.

Addressing the media during the registration exercise at Sege in the Ada West District on Thursday, Mr Thomas Boateng Quaison, Head, Monitoring and Evaluation, LEAP Project, said beneficiaries would be migrated onto the e-zwich platform where they would have greater control over the management of their funds as they would decide when to access their funds.

Mr Quaison encouraged beneficiaries to register their caregivers, who would continue to access the funds for the household even at a time when the beneficiary is dead.

“This platform comes with second level biometric verification, which will authenticate the identity of the beneficiary or caregiver thereby preventing impersonation during payments.”

Hon. Christian Otuteye, Member of Parliament (MP) for Sege, expressed gratitude to the Government of Ghana and the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection for making his constituents in the Ada West District beneficiaries of LEAP, which, according to him, has led to some improvements in the livelihoods of the aged.

Hon. Otuteye urged the beneficiaries to make good use of the cash grants they would receive and if possible support others who were yet to be captured on the LEAP program.

He pleaded with the Ministry to extend the programme to people in the neighbouring communities to improve their livelihoods.

The biometric registration will cover a total of 675 LEAP beneficiaries in Sege