Woes for federal workers as govt fails to pay salary
There is growing restiveness among the staff of the federal civil service, ministries, departments and agencies, and MDAs, over unpaid January salaries.
The worker’s situation is compounded by the fact that they also owed a backlog of N35,000 in wage awards.
It was gathered that non-payment of the January salary to core civil servants and non-core civil servants is due to the inability of the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation, OAGF, to finalise the 2024 Appropriation on the Government Integrated Financial Management System, GIFMIS, platform.
The failure has prevented the release of the personnel warrant for January 2024 for salary payment.
General Secretary of the Nigeria Civil Service Union, NCSU, Bomoi Muhammed Ibraheem, confirmed to Vanguard that members of the union have not been paid.
A staff federal secretariat, Abuja, who lamented the situation, told Vanguard: ”The federal civil servants are frustrated with the delayed payment of January salary. Everybody knows what is going on in Nigeria today.
”The economic situation is unbearable, all because of government policies. The N35,000 wage award promised after the removal of the subsidy on petrol was only paid in September. Now, the government has refused to pay us January salary thereby compounding our woes.
”How do they expect us to meet our responsibilities to our families including school fees and other necessities? We cannot continue like this.”
To douse the restiveness of its staff, the management of the National Mathematical Centre, Abuja, in an internal memo dated January 31, 2024, titled “Delay in the payment of January 2024 salary”, among others said “We wish to inform you that January 2024 salaries will be delayed beyond normal.”