Governors
from the 36 states have said they will abide by the directive of President
Muhammadu Buhari to pay all outstanding salary arrears before Christmas.
They, however, gave a condition to be met for
them to comply with the directive.
This was revealed by Governor Rochas Okorocha
of Imo State while briefing State House correspondents after the governors held
a closed-door meeting with Mr. Buhari inside the council chamber of the
Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Mr. Okorocha, who confirmed the directive from
Mr. Buhari, said the payment of the arrears is dependent on the president’s
approval of the payment of the 50 per cent Paris Club loan refund.
“Yes, with the Paris Club coming, every worker
should enjoy his/her Christmas”, Mr. Okorocha said.
The Imo governor also said: “the president has
expressed the need to make ensure that every Nigerian especially the workers
have a beautiful Christmas and the issue of outstanding Paris club was
discussed and that was taken care of.”
He said the governors put pressure on the
president to get approval for the balance so that they (governors) can make
adequate appropriation arrangements.
“We also made a request for Mr. President’s
approval so that the balance should form part of our 2018 budget, because we
can’t include it, until we are sure that the money is coming. That was also
sorted out.
“So, as it is now, the issue of workers took
the centre stage and Mr. President was concerned about those who depend on
their salaries to feed their families and pay their house rent and he had the
assurance from the governors that we will meet up those obligations”, he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment