Is This Link Replicating the Presidential Youth Empowerment Scheme Legitimate?

This link making rounds on WhatsApp claims to be giving employment opportunities to youth from Kenya, South Africa, Ghana, India, Uganda and Nigeria. By filling a survey and sharing the link, participants are apparently able to receive a 50,000 grant.

Background

The Presidential Youth Empowerment Scheme (P-YES) is a public-private partnership created by the office of the Special Assistant to the President on Youth and Students Affairs (OSA-PYSA) and the Nigerian government, multilateral development organizations and private sectors. The objective of this initiative is to create employment for youth in Nigeria. It also looks to cover the 774 local government areas in the 36 Nigerian states. 

From the P-YES Incubation Programme, each of the 774,000 beneficiaries are expected to produce at least one beneficiary over a period of 12 months after being empowered with a seed business tool. That is, for every youth who receives training from this program, they reciprocate that to another after training.

Piga Firimbi previously looked at a similar link promising funds through one Youth Empowerment and Development Organization. 

Verification

Launched on October 12, 2020 by President Muhammadu Buhari, Google search results reveal that the official website linked to this program was registered on April 29, 2021, with p-yes.net as its domain name.

However, the website circulating on WhatsApp was created on July 13, 2021, with ethut.co as its domain name according to results from a WhoIs.com search.

Additionally, a fact-check on the 211 Check website flagged this link as a scam. Seemingly, the same link has been circulating since October 18, 2021, days after this program was launched in Nigeria. 

The fact-check reads;

“Presidential Youth Empowerment Scheme is not registered as a valid youth empowerment scheme anywhere in Africa but on the contrary Nigeria recently launched Presidential Youth Entrepreneurship Support (P-YES) whose official logo exists on the fake site’s landing page”. 

Verdict

This link claiming to offer employment to youth in Uganda, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, India and Kenya is a SCAM.

This story was produced by Africa Uncensored in partnership with Code for Africa with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie.