Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State on Wednesday in Ibadan said government would not rescind its decision on the “No Work No Pay’’ rule against striking workers.
Ajimobi, who made the assertion while monitoring attendance of workers at the State Secretariat, described as satisfactory the level of attendance and compliance with government directive.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the governor was accompanied by Alhaji Ishmael Alli, the Secretary to the State Government, Mr Soji Eniade, the Head of Service as well as other aides.
The group went round the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, Ministry of Lands and Physical Planning, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Works and Transport and Ministry of Agriculture.
“You can see that work is going on smoothly here. We are happy about the attendance. We will not pay those who are not in their offices.
“We have appealed to the striking workers to return to work but they remained adamant. We know some of them, they don’t even come to work when there was no strike.
“We have told them that “no work no pay’’ and we are going to stand by it,’’ he said.
Ajimobi said that workers absent from duty would forfeit their pay.
Speaking to newsmen after the inspection, Ajimobi urged the labour leaders to embrace modern day unionism, devoid of brigandage, subterfuge and thuggery.
“Modern day unionism is driven by engagement, consultation and productivity. If you don’t want us to implement a policy, you will come to us and tell us.
“We gave them the opportunity to come up with their ideas and proposal but they disrupted the stakeholders’ meeting.
“We want a labour union that will engage us in intellectual discourse and not those who still display the stone age labour practices,’’ he said.
The governor said that the entire labour force in the state was not more than 100,000, in comparison to the 10 million population of the state.
The governor denied rumour making the rounds that the state government collected N84 billion from the Federal Government between May 2015 and May 2016.
He said that the said amount was a combined allocation of both the state government and the local governments, adding that only N42 billion was received for the state during the period.
Ajimobi, however, said that a detailed breakdown of how the money was spent would soon be made available, saying that the money was used in paying workers salary.
