Michael Jejede l Friday, November 24, 2017
BENUE, Nigeria – Immediate past Minister of Interior, Comrade Patrick Abba Moro, has said that the Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, should come out clean on the issue of the state workforce and wage bill, rather than to continue to deceive the public on the true position of things.
Moro, a chieftain of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and leading voice of opposition in Benue State, said this while reacting to a recent report, indicating that the Benue government was considering the options of either retrenching or reducing salaries to solve the problem of non-regular payment of workers emolument.
The disclosure of the two options to be considered was made by the Deputy Governor of the state, Benson Abounu, who is also the chairman of the screening committee verifying the actual workforce of both the state and local governments, at the stakeholders’ meeting held on Monday in Government House, Makurdi. The deputy governor had said the screening committee discovered numerous irregularities that could have been responsible for the huge salary bill of the state which he puts at N7.8bn monthly.
However, Moro described the said plan as wicked and unacceptable, warning that any attempt to implement any of the suggested options will be staunchly resisted in the interest of the Benue State workers.
Moro further stated that instead of talking about sacking or reducing the salaries of innocent workers, Ortom should summon the needed courage to get rid of workers that are non-existent yet have their names in the pay roll.
“The reported threat by the Benue State government to retrench workers or reduce salaries is a smokescreen, a mischievous attempt at goatscaping. The reality is that the workforce of Benue State public service is not up to the number being peddled by the Benue State government and I have challenged them on several instances to publish the last salary records of the immediate past administration of ex-Governor Gabriel Suswan to tell the Nigerian public from where the humongous workforce and over seven billion naira salary bill being peddled are coming.
“Let the government of Benue State muster the needful political will to exorcise the non-existing workers whose names are on the pay roll and we have the real Benue State government workers and salary bill. Any attempt to use the current contrapted workforce and salary bill to retrench workers or reduce salaries will be resisted by Benue State government workers,” the PDP stalwart declared.
Comrade Moro is one of the frontline politicians and critics that have continued to express displeasure about the “way and manner” workers were being treated under the current Ortom-led All Progressives Congress (APC) in Benue State. He had at several occasions hit hard at Ortom, describing him as being clueless and inept to pilot the affairs of Benue State to an enviable height.
