By Amos Aar
CIVIL servants in Benue State are celebrating Easter amidst hunger as a result of the non-payment of their salaries except for local government workers who are now benefiting financial autonomy.
Some state workers who spoke with National Record on Saturday on the condition of anonymity for fear of victimisation said they have not been paid for four consecutive months.
Two staff of the Benue State Ministry of Information said they have been expecting December salary to enable them buy at least food stuff for their children to no avail.
“We have not received any salary for the month. The salary is not even a current one, it is for December 2022. For this year, we have not started receiving anything”, one of them revealed.
The situation is the same for workers at Government House, Makurdi. A civil servant who was employed in September 2022 lamented that he was paid only two months’ salary since he started work and that he is being owed for four months.
“I don’t even have anything to buy food for my family. Going to work these days is another challenge because I spend N500 to and fro while my salary is not coming.
“I am appealing to our governor to pay us at least two months’ salaries so that we will have food to eat and transport fare to go to work,” he appealed.
The non-payment of salaries has also affected businesses adversely. Mrs Hembadoon Tyohemba who sells foodstuff at Wurukum Market, Makurdi told National Record that she was experiencing low patronage as people were not coming to buy even when she set prices low.
“This year’s Easter is not like other years because people are not buying at all. Everybody is complaining that there’s no money. Government workers are saying they have not been paid,” Mrs Tyohemba observed.
Hajiya Khadijat Yusuf who sells garri, rice and beans at Wadata Market said “there is nothing like brisk business this time. It’s 2pm now but only one person has bought 3 mudus of beans from me so far”.
Speaking on his inability to pay salaries and pension when he featured on Arise TV, Benue State governor, Samuel Ortom, said he requested for a N40 billion loan for that purpose but was denied the opportunity by the Debts Management Office (DMO).
He also stated that Benue civil servants have understood with him about the paucity of funds which he claimed has been hindering payment of their salaries and that that is why they have not embarked on industrial strike since he came on board as governor.
Ortom did not leave Benue workers with hope on Arise TV as whether there was any other way out to pay their salaries apart from the loan he was denied or they are to wait for next administration to pay them.
