In Plateau State, civil officials have begun a five-day warning strike that began on Monday.
After the government failed to pay their salaries for three months, the employees made the decision to temporarily stop working.
Additionally, the workers made the decision to strike because the government refused to release third-party deductions like their contributory pension.
Titus Malau, the chairman of the Joint National Public Service Negotiating Council (JNPSNC), stated that they decided to go on strike after realizing that the government was not doing enough to pay them their unpaid salaries during a press conference on Monday at the conference room of the Labour House in Jos, the state capital.
The workers’ decision to strike comes a day after the state’s head of civil service, Sunday Chong, assured them that their unpaid salaries will be paid by the government.
The state government was forewarned by the leadership of the major labor unions last Thursday that workers would strike if their unpaid pay were not paid on Monday.
The unions said that the government’s inability to uphold an agreement agreed with them led to the need for the action.
“This became necessary in light of the fact that the Government disregarded our demands, particularly the agreement struck on November 11, 2022, with the Secretary to the Government of the State’s intervention,” he stated (SGS).
“The following are the JNPSNC’s requirements: Paying no salaries for a period of three months starting in September 2022, not releasing the salary structure to serve as a reference for calculating salaries, not releasing third-party deductions beginning in August 2022, and not releasing promotions and annual raises with all back pay, as appropriate.
Other issues, according to Mr. Malau, “include nonpayment of January and February 2022 yearly increment arrears; Inability of Government to Properly Constitute and Launch the Joint National Service Negotiating Council in the State.”
The high-powered staff audit committee led by Nde Gobak’s White Paper report was criticized by JNPSNC for neglecting to upgrade staff members who were eligible for promotions.
“We expected them to have complied with the agreement by November 14, 2022, and the complete payment of the August salary and the payment of the salaries for September and October were also expected to be made by the end of November, but here we are in December.
“Automatically, nothing has been done on anything we have discussed and agreed upon. They obviously disregarded our agreement because even the August salary was cut in half. Therefore, we can begin counting in August, September, October, and November, and ideally, by this point, we should be equally qualified for our December salaries, said Eugene Manji, the Plateau State Chairman of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC).
