The protesters, in a video seen by SaharaReporters on Tuesday, were seen lamenting non-payment of their salaries.
Some staff of the Ugwunagbo local government area in Abia State, who have not been paid their salaries in the past four months, have locked the Council headquarters demanding they should be paid.
The protesters, in a video seen by SaharaReporters on Tuesday, were seen lamenting non-payment of their salaries.
Although the protesting workers acknowledged that the government had paid some of them, they insisted that over 40 percent of staff had not been paid, insisting that they were not ghost workers as the Abia State Government had portrayed them.
In the video, the gate of the council headquarters was seen locked with a key while the protesting workers numbering over 30 were seen standing in clusters.
A man in the video was overheard saying: “This Ugwunagbo local government area Secretariat of Abia State is under lock and key as you can see.
“There will be no entrance until our salaries are paid. From Ugwunagbo local government unpaid workers: His Excellency; Dr Alex C. Otti Executive Governor of Abia State, pay us our four months’ salary. We are not ghost workers.
“If people can bear me witness, most of the people that received their salaries so far are even dead staff. The people who are working as consultants at Umuahia don’t know anybody at all. If there should be any sort of screening, let them invite all staff of local government to Umuahia so that they can be screened.
“We don’t like a situation where most of our staff will not receive their salaries and some will receive their salaries. This is four months now nobody is happy, Four months is not four days we have families, we have children to cater to and we have no Kobo to take care of them. Look at how fuel subsidy is removed, looks at how far we are suffering.
“Please, anybody who is close to our dear governor should let him know that the staff of Ugwunagbo have not received their salaries for the last four months and we have people to take care of. The gate to the local government will be under lock and key until our salaries are paid,” the workers lamented.
It should be recalled that Governor Alex Otti-led Abia State Government recently announced that it had saved over N200 million on the monthly wage bill, following an ongoing verification of civil servants and other public workers that eliminated over 2,300 ghost workers from the state’s payroll.
A statement by Kazie Uko, Chief Press Secretary to Governor Otti then stated that the state Accountant General, Njum Onyemenam, revealed that the saving was made using a unified payment system.
She confirmed that workers had received the payment of April salaries as well as June pensions to retirees.