TheCable

The Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) says 23 states of the federation currently owe local government workers salary arrears.

Ibrahim Khaleel, national president of the union, made this known in a statement on Monday.

He said the arrears ranged from one to 16 months.

Khaleel revealed that with between 10 and to 16 months, Bayelsa was leading in states indebted to local council workers,  followed by Kogi which is between seven and 15 months.

Delta state followed closely with eight to 14 months, and Kaduna, 12 months; Oyo, three to 11 months; Edo, 10 months; Abia, five to nine months; Kwara, two to nine months; Benue, nine months and Nasarawa, seven months.

Ondo, Ekiti, Imo have six months each, while Zamfara has not implemented minimum wage; Adamawa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Ebonyi, Plateau are owing four months, while Taraba and FCT, three months.

According to the statement, Osun has been paying half salaries for 24 months and a few staff are being owed some months in Enugu.

The union said Ekiti has refused to remit union dues for the past nine months and Ogun has not also remitted its deduction for seven months.

The NULGE president also said that 700 staff members were owed between one to three months in Cross River state.

He called on governors to ensure the salaries and other allowances of local council workers were offset with the second tranche of the Paris loan refund.

He said failure to do so could force it to shut down all local government councils in the country.

Reacting to the statement of governors that the amount released did not conform with figures which were published, he said: “We want to state in strong terms that no governor should either divert or tamper with the fund.

“This should be an avenue where the backlog of arrears of salaries owed the local government workers and some other welfare packages should be settled.

“This is in order to ameliorate the untold hardship they are currently passing through due to this ugly situation.”

Khaleed also commended states that are up to date in the entitlement of local government workers.

According to him, the 14 states are Lagos, Ogun, Kano, Katsina, Jigawa, Sokoto, Kebbi, Bauchi, Borno, Yobe, Gombe, Cross River, Niger and Anambra.