NULGE, MHWU threaten to drag Dickson before EFCC over unpaid salaries

The National Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) and its Medical and Health Workers Union (MHWUN) counterpart, Bayelsa State Chapters, have threatened to drag the State Governor, Henry Seriake Dickson, to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and to report him to President Mohammadu Buhari, if he failed, within seven days, to release for payment the N1.2billion bailout fund he received from the Federal Government to off-set the local government workers’ salaries, whom according to them, some have been owed up to thirteen months.
In a communique issued at the end of the joint executive council of the two unions in Yenagoa and signed by the Secretaries of the two unions, Comrades Tonye Jaja and Arafat Letam Wibani, respectively, and made available to newsmen, the unions stated that if the government failed to release the fund, they would have no other option than to invite the Economic and Crimes Financial Commission to step in and recover the money.
According to the group, they would not accept the fifty percent salary payment as proposed to them by the government, stressing that the wages and salaries of workers were guided by law and could not be slashed except the employees were convinced of the financial position of the state.
The unions further called on the Commissioner for Local Government and Administration, Hon. Agatha Goma, to always release the monthly statutory allocation after the Joint Allocation Committee(JAC ) to the various Local Government Councils, as required by law, while urging the state government to, without delay, release the full January and February salaries to the genuine, verified and confirmed staff of the local government and also advised the government to release ten percent of the internally generated revenue(IGR) and twenty percent of the derivation funds for the running of the councils.