The Imo State branch of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has claimed that workers in Imo receive the lowest wages in Nigeria.
The party called on the State Government to restore dignity to the civil service and make it more attractive by improving worker treatment, in a statement from its State Publicity Secretary, Lancelot Obiaku.
The PDP also condemned the State Government under Hope Uzodinma for purportedly misleading civil servants with what it called a deceitful adjustment of the national minimum wage.
The statement underscored a decline in the civil service workers’ pride in Imo State, as they grapple with daily economic challenges amidst ongoing negligence and maltreatment from the State government.
Clearly, the State is short of workforce, and there is no urgency on the side of the government to rejig it. But what is also important to note is that young people in the State appear not interested anymore in joining the civil service.
“How can they be when Imo workers are paid the lowest salary in the entire Nigeria. People wouldn’t want to be associated with an employee who shortchanges his workers by denying them their promotion benefits and who refuses to actually implement the minimum wage.
As a party, we have in recent times held the informed position that the Imo State government had yet to implement the old ₦30,000 minimum wage, given that level 10 and 12 workers in various ministries barely earned around ₦50,000 monthly. Today, what we have is a situation where a senior worker earns almost the same as a junior worker.
“If a level 5 worker earns ₦71,000 and a level 12 worker earns ₦73,000, will you call that payment of minimum wage? Where did the tens of thousands that should accrue to the level 12 worker go? Do you know the irony? Workers who are at level 5 and below do not constitute up to 10 percent of the workforce.
The government employed workers from Government House on the payroll. The labour union and several ministries were not involved in the input. The salary table used by the government for salary payments has not been seen by anyone. It’s a fraudulent scheme,” the statement emphasized.
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