The immediate past Minister of Interior, Comrade Abba Moro, has counseled the governor of Benue State, Samuel Ortom, to stop further lamentations and settle down to pay Benue State workers their entitlements.
Moro stated that Benue State workers who worked hard to get Ortom elected do not deserve the ill treatment being meted out to them by the governor.
“It is not a lie when people say that as much as Three Hundred Billion Naira (N300b) has passed through this (Ortom’s) administration since the last two years that it came to power. In fact, the combined effect of the statutory revenue allocations, bailout funds, Paris club refunds, loans that have been taken and internally generated revenue amounts to well over three hundred billion naira that has accrued to the Benue State government since the inception of the APC/Ortom led government. How much is the cumulative amount of salaries and allowances of Benue State workers and pensioners?” Moro asked.
The former Interior Minister challenged Ortom to publish item by item what Benue’s money has been used for that the government could not pay the salaries and allowances of workers.
Comrade Moro insisted that “the people of Benue State cannot continue to be pauperized while individuals and their businesses are growing by lips and bound. Benue people are wallowing in abject poverty. Benue people are hurting. This is not acceptable.”
“Sadly, the governor stated that the payment of salaries and allowances were not his priority since he was not elected just to pay salaries and allowances. The tragedy of the Benue situation is that no meaningful projects have been undertaken, executed and commissioned since the inception of the APC/Ortom government in Makurdi. Unless there are things that other people know that I don’t know. While other states are executing and commissioning people- oriented projects, all we hear from the Benue State government are lamentations of paucity of funds and blaming of the past government even on a natural disaster such as flooding. Where have the funds accruing to the government of Benue State taken flight to?” the PDP stalwart queried.
He challenged Governor Ortom and members of the Benue State House of Assembly to publish their last pay slips to show that they have not been paid for as long as workers have not been paid.
Moro said he was pained that Ortom became his governor as averred by the governor’s media aide because he knew that the Benue helmsman lacked the capacity and competence to administer the state effectively, adding that “everybody who knows this fact should be pained.”
Moro, a top member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from Benue State, made this assertion in Abuja while reacting to the warning strike embarked upon by workers in the state public service.
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