Workers in Kogi State are to smile soon with higher salaries despite the crunching economic situation that has threatened payment of salaries in other states.
The new boost will however have to wait for the outcome of a screening exercise going on in the state to wipe off thousands of ghost workers allegedly siphoning the state resources.
Governor Yahaya Bello made the declarations in Lokoja on Sunday while addressing the workers to mark the May Day, saying at the Confluence Stadium Lokoja that his administration would be different from the previous administrations.
He said: “When we came into office Kogi workers were already on strike for at least six weeks, fed up with the government of the day then which was characterised with kleptomania, lack of transparency and disastrous policies. It hurts me that a so-called government could receive all the federal allocations and still found it hard to pay workers. I decided that my administration would be different.”
The governor said: “We remain committed to improving the lot of our workers by eliminating every scheme in the system designed to exploit and cheat them.”
The Kogi State number one citizen also disclosed that ghost worker syndrome would be attacked with all the might his administration could muster.
Bello emphasised that as soon as the screening exercise that would end in one week time is over, he would commence payment of salary to screened workers in the payroll, adding that ghost workers shall cease to receive bank alert that he said siphoned the resources of the on a monthly basis.
He said: “No more will people sit in pay office and fabricate thousands of names and add them to the normal roll to siphon Kogi State’s resources. No more will they sit down in Lagos, Abuja, or even abroad and receive banks alert for salaries from Kogi State government. No more will Kogi State pay salaries to ghost worker who are serving in non-existing institutions discovered all over the state by the screening committee. We are dismantling the satanic infrastructure. Our people will no longer be robbed.”
He seized the opportunity to sound a warning to every genuine worker in Kogi State civil service to ensure that they were screened, adding that they should seek the screening committee and get screened.
He added: “It is our aspiration to build that ideal workforce in Kogi State. However reality shows we have a lot of work to do. We cannot deceive ourselves that all is rosy with the worker, whether in the other places in Nigeria or here ay home in Kogi State.”
Bello also said his administration inherited a state in which unpaid salaries and atrocious working condition were the norm, adding that all sorts of tricks were devised by the previous administration to short-change the Kogi State workers.
He said ‘I was a former federal civil servant. I was never owed salaries during my time in service’.
He donated two brand new buses to state chapter of NLC and TUC and charged their leaders to deploy the vehicles in the best interest of the members and in service to God and humanity.
He equally felicitated with all the workers in the state and promised the administration’s continued commitment to their welfare and right.
