Benue State GovernorBenue State Governor, Samuel Ortom has set up a committee, headed by his deputy, Enginneer Benson Abounu to work out modalities for the settlement of salary arrears to workers in the state.
At a meeting today, Friday, with labour leaders at the New Banquet Hall of the Benue Peoples House in Makurdi, the governor picked the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Finance, Matthew Uyina, as Secretary.
Other members are Commissioners of Finance, Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice, their colleagues in the Ministries of Health and Information as well as Advisers on Labour, Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Development Cooperation, Rural Development and Cooperatives.
Labour leaders on the committee are Comrade Godwin Anya, State Chairman, Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, Comrade Terungwa Igbe, President, Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees, NULGE, Comrade Philip Ter Nongu, State Chairman, Joint Councils one, two and three, and Comrade Ordue Tartenger, Trade Union Congress chairman.
Governor Ortom said that the state government had decided to prioritize salary payment as well as the exploration of every means to obtain funds, including borrowing to clear arrears.
He gave the committee’s terms of reference as include pruning of the State wage bill, fishing out ghost workers and perpetrators of fraud with regard to the issue. [myad]
