The Kogi State government has refuted reports from the labour unions in the state that it owed some of its workers fifteen months’ salaries.
The government stated that the salary arrears were only for twelve months salaries and not
as alleged by labour unions.
Edward Onoja, the Chief of Staff to Governor Yahaya Bello, who said this on Monday during a phone interview said those being owed were on the “uncleared list”.
He said this while speaking on Sunrise Daily, a Channels Television breakfast show.
Onoja said, “Recall that the state government embarked on a staff verification exercise effective February 24, 2016, and in that exercise staffers were categorised into cleared and uncleared, cleared means those who had no issues, whose documents and employment records are straight and correct, all those persons have received their salaries up until March 2017, inclusive of arrears owed them even from the past administration.
“There are other persons who were on the uncleared category as at the report in December 2016. His Excellency based on resolve by all stakeholders in Kogi state to give a final appeal chance for them, set up an appeal committee that rounded up their requisite just last week and more people have now been migrated from the uncleared list to the cleared list, nearly 60 percent of those that were in December classified as uncleared. Just yesterday as a prelude to the May Day celebration, His Excellency also granted clemency to those who actually had violated the civil service rule and who were supposed to be dismissed and because of his compassion to ensure that he gives people more room, he pardoned about eleven infractions.”
When asked how many months salaries those moved from the uncleared to cleared list were owed, Onoja said, “Nobody is being owed fifteen months, maximum will be twelve months. Fifteen months is falsehood and I can defend that anyway.”
