GOVERNOR Samuel Ortom of BENUE State is set to jet out of the country on Friday to the United States of America (USA) for a 7-day holiday as the state’s civil servants celebrate Sallah without salaries.
Chief Press Secretary to the governor, Nathaniel Ikyur, who announced Governor’s Ortom’s holiday in a statement on Friday said “the Governor is expected back in the country on April 28, 2023”.
Just as the state’s Christian workers celebrated Easter with pay a fortnight ago, their Muslim counterparts are also celebrating Eid-el-Fitr without salaries payment. The state’s civil servants have now gone without pay for over 8 months now, National Record gathered.
Pensioners in the state are facing the same bitter experience as they have not been paid for 76 months at the local government level and 35 months at the state level.
Both serving workers and pensioners in the state have continued to lament their inability to afford common staple foods for their families’ daily upkeep let alone special food items for holidays of this nature.
A civil servant at the State Secretariat Makurdi, who pleaded anonymity for fear of witch-hunt told National Record on Friday that he longer thinks about Sallah clothes for his children again even as a Muslim.
“I cannot give gifts to people like before and I cannot sew clothes for my children because I have not been paid for months now. My major challenge now is food which my children should eat,” he lamented.
Barrister Ahmed Tijani in an interview at the Eid-praying ground at the Arabic Primary School, Makurdi, noted that although they celebrated the Eid-el-Fitr in hardship, he was happy that the essence of the festivity was fulfilled.
“You see us exchanging pleasantries and that is memorable to us. We appreciate Allah for giving us the opportunity to be here together.
“The difference is that we understand that there is hardship but we kept that hardship outside and we are here to celebrate and Allah will provide for us including the whole Nigeria,” Tijani said as he compared this year’s Eid-el-Fitr with the previous years’.
