Photo: Rubon JR Jacklick.
The second Enra quarterly distribution has reportedly been pushed back to the end of March — both to complete the registration process for several thousand new applicants and to vet them for actual residence in the RMI.
As the Enra — or universal basic income program — is only for citizens living in RMI, a concern of program administrators is Marshallese who registered for the program while visiting Majuro and who subsequently returned to their places of residence outside RMI.
“MISSA and the Immigration Division are working together,” said Finance Minister David Paul to the Journal earlier this week.
He said Immigration was reviewing out-bound departures from Majuro and Kwajalein for citizens who did not return within a three-month period, who would then be removed from the Enra registration listing by MISSA, which is managing the program.
There are certain exemptions for those off-island, including RMI diplomatic staff, patients on medical referral, and students on scholarship.
The second quarterly payment, which was originally scheduled for the last week of February, in keeping with the quarterly payment initiated at the end of November, was initially pushed back by a week to the first week of March. Now it will be made at the end of March, according to Paul.
About 4,000 additional citizens have been registered since the first payment, increasing the total to over 37,000. This will also inevitably reduce the amount paid per capita since the $27 million appropriated for this year for Enra is a fixed amount to be shared equally among all eligible citizens.
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