Buhari’s pay directive: Governors, workers clash looms
The presidential directive to governors to pay civil servants’ salaries before Christmas may pit the states’ chief executive officers against organised labour.
Reason: the balance of the Paris/London Club refund from which the governors are expected to settle the workers may be a far cry from what is required, especially in states owing huge arrears of salaries. Osagie Otabor, Odunayo Ogunmola, Nicholas Kalu, Mike Odiegwu, Rosemary Nwisi, Suleiman Adamu, Damisi Ojo, Ernest Nwokolo, Anthony Bassey, Adekunle Jimoh and Adesoji Adeniyi report that the local chapters of the workers’ unions look set to challenge their employers across the states.
PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari’s directive to governors to settle workers’ salaries before Christmas may have widened the gulf between the states’ helmsmen and organised labour.
The directive was reportedly given on Monday after the President met with the governors at the State House in Abuja.
The President directed Finance Minister Mrs. Kemi Adeosun and Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele to release the 50 per cent balance of the Paris/London Club refund to enable the states carry out his directive.
Labour hailed the President for the gesture and urged its members to look forward for a rosy Yuletide.
But if feelers from the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) are anything to go by, the hope of having a blissful Christmas may remain in the realm of a dream for the workers.
The governors said the President never said that all arrears of salaries should be paid before Christmas.
Besides, they foreclosed the possibility of getting their shares of the Paris/London Club refund before Christmas ,given the delay in the past when the President gave such directives.
The workers, through their local chapters in the states, are already counting days. Those in debtor-states are upbeat that the arrears of their salaries will be cleared.
Governors must be monitored
In Cross River State, the Trade Union Congress (TUC) commended the President for the gesture and urged him to raise monitors to guard against misapplication of the funds when released to the governors.
TUC local chairman Clarkson Otu said: “We must commend the President for the interest he has shown in the welfare of the workers of Nigeria. He has shown that he is very welfare-oriented, he is worker-friendly and, of course, he knows that these salary earners and low-income earners are really the people bearing the brunt of this recession and tight economic situation.
“You see him giving bailout and the Paris Club refund. He has continually stated that they should be used to defray outstanding salaries, pensions, gratuity and such other related allowances. So, he has done well in that regard.
“But the problem is whether it would translate to the benefit of the people when the governors get this money; whether they would use it for such purposes, because that is the problem we have.
We have no issues with arrears of salaries in Cross River State. The problem we have is the outstanding of monumental arrears of gratuity, which is climbing close to N30 billion now. “That has been our major concern. We have been shouting. It is our prayer and hope the man should put part of the money received if not all to address the issues of gratuity.
“I hope the governors would have that kind of sympathy for workers to deploy those funds appropriately. It is unfortunate that some governors, despite getting these funds, still don’t put them to use for what they were meant for. The leadership in the various states are not sensitive to the plight of the workers and the people. They are very greedy and wicked.
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