Imo civil servants salary to drop by 30%

Imo State Civil servants are in for gloomy days ahead following a drastic shortfall in dwindling revenue of the state which is likely to affect the payment of salaries and allowances of workers in the state.

Our Correspondent recalled that the organised labour and the state government on February 20, 2016 signed an agreement on the sharing formula of 70 percent and 30 percent respectively of the total revenue accrued to the state for the payment of salaries and allowances of workers in the state civil service.

Addressing a joint press conference on Wednesday in Owerri, State Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Austine Chilakpu, said that the 18-man state/Labour joint committee had verified the wage bill of salary and pension for the month of January which stood at N5.3 billion.

He said that the committee in receipt of the sum of N3,373 billion for the settlement of salary and pension due for workers in the state, for the month of January, the committee decided to pay all salary earners in the state 70 percent of their salary across board. He also disclosed that over N500 million has been reserved for the payment of pension.

“The said N3,373,826,736.67 billion as at this morning dropped into the Imo State/Local government/Labour Joint Salary Account at Zenith Bank after the sum of about N84 million expected to come from 13 percent oil derivation account”, he said.

According to him, Labour has set up a sub-committee comprising accountants and financial experts to verify and authentic revenue accrued to the state and work out the modalities to ensure that ghost workers are eliminated from the state wage bill.

The labour boss who dismissed rumours making the rounds that the committee is performing the duties of state government, assured the civil servants that there was no salary cut in the month of January even as he pleaded with them to exercise patience with the committee.

“We are only two weeks old. That we are paying their salaries does not mean that we believe wholeheartedly what the state government has given to us. We are only trying to ensure that workers are paid for the month of January. We are mobilising experts to look into the documents given to us by the state government.

“We (Labour) don’t support the employment and causalization of workers. We called on those concerned to regularize the appointments of affected workers. It is inhuman for somebody to work for a year without regularising his/her appointment. We call on the state government to confirm the appointments of those who had worked for a year and above”, he stressed.

Also speaking, chairman of the joint committee and Special Adviser to Governor Rochas Okorocha (Technical), Mr. Ikenna Emeh disclosed that some staff of parastatals have been redeployed to the Board of Internal Revenue (BIR) to beef the monthly revenue of the state.

He further stated that the state Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) for the month of February has increased by 40 percent and the government is targeting One Billion Naira monthly.