Federal workers demand payment of salaries

Some federal civil servants yesterday trooped to the office of the Head of Service (HOS) to demand payment of their salaries amid speculation that the Federal Government is broke..

The Guardian gathered that the workers from core Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) converged on the office of the HOS as early as 8.30am.
A source in the office said the core ministries were being owed October salary, while workers in some parastatals, departments and agencies had not been paid for between two and three months.

“Some of us in the agencies are suffering. They say that we overemployed workers, so they have not paid us for between two and three months. It is a sad development because we are equally hearing that the Federal Government is even broke and that we have exhausted our 2020 budget on personnel,’’ the source said.

Another source said: ‘’The morale of officers and men of the Federal Fire Service, for instance, is now at an all-time low following the inability of government to pay their salaries promptly.

‘’Beginning from the weekend, speculations were rife that some MDAs in the federal civil service were said to have exhausted their 2020 personnel costs and therefore unable to pay staff salaries.’’

The Guardian also gathered that funds meant for personnel costs are domiciled in an account overseen by the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS) department in the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF).

The Director of Information, Olawunmi Ogunmosunle, denied that there was protest around the office of the HOS.‘’There was no protest in HOS office. Enough provisions were made for salaries for 2020 in line with government tradition. A percentage was also set aside to take care of salary increase.

“The provisions made based on previous salary have been exhausted. The Budget Office has, therefore, asked each MDA to work out what is needed to take care of the increase for money to be paid from what has been set aside. The committee is now working on this, it is expected that it will be concluded this week and all salaries will be paid,” she explained.”