A statement issued in Accra and copied the Ghana News Agency said a total number of 212,919 beneficiary households in 216 districts will be paid their LEAP grants. The statement said throughout the payments, one eligible member household will receive GHC64.00, two eligible member household will receive GHC76.00, while three eligible member household will receive GHC88.00 and more than three eligible member household will receive GHC106.00.

The statement added that, the payment covers September and October 2016.

According to the statement the 45th cycle payment also includes 192 households from ‘Alleged Witches Camps’ in Gushiegu (Northern Region), the Tamale Children’s Home (Northern Region), and the Bekwai Central Destitute Infirmary (Ashanti Region).

The rest are the Mampong Babies Home (Ashanti Region), Ankaful Leprosarium in the Central Region, Osu Children’s Home in Greater Accra, and St Joseph Orphanage at Jirapa in Upper West Region.The statement said beneficiaries of these “institutions’ are special social category who benefit from the LEAP Programme by automatic inclusion and stated that, the inclusion of the specialised category as LEAP beneficiaries is in line with the Programme’s objective to reduce the plight of the vulnerable and marginalized in the society.

“All beneficiaries of the LEAP Programme will be paid electronically on the e-zwich platform provided by Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS), through Participating Financial Institutions (PFI’s). The e-zwich payment platform requires biometric fingerprint verification of beneficiaries for payment to be effected,” the statement said.

The statement said LEAP Programme operates on the principle that “without biometric verification there will be no grant cash-out or payment” to beneficiaries’ households. To facilitate the access to health care services, LEAP Programme beneficiaries are participating in a nationwide National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) registration exercise.

The statement said: “The registration exercise is currently on-going. To date a total of 91,118 LEAP household members have been registered free-of- charge onto NHIS and it’s expected to end by December 21, 2016.  “Emergency LEAP is therefore a temporary cash grant which is provided to people who have been affected by social, environmental and natural disasters, the cash grant serves as support to assist them to cope with the impact of the disasters and thereby stabilize them.

“Persons/households, who are Emergency LEAP beneficiaries receive the cash grant for a brief period usually three months. Four districts namely Bawku West, Bongo, Builsa South and Talensi of the Upper East Region were affected by rainstorms and floods,” the statement said.

The statement said the LEAP programme have supported a total of 2984 affected persons from these four districts under the emergency LEAP. The first payment which covered the months of September and October 2016 was paid to these affected persons, with each beneficiary receiving GHC200.00 for two months.

The statement said the final and second payment to these Emergency LEAP beneficiaries is scheduled for November 28 to December 1, 2016.  The LEAP Programme Secretariat acknowledged some stakeholders including Metropolitan/Municipal/District Assemblies (MMDAs), UNICEF, Department for International Development (DfID), and the World Bank for their continuous support to the LEAP.