The Nation Newspaper

Tag: KOGI

  • Kogi now haven for Boko Haram – Governor

    Kogi now haven for Boko Haram – Governor

    Yahaya Bello of Kogi on Tuesday said that following the technical defeat of the Boko Haram insurgency in the North-East, its fleeing members had found a haven in his state.

    Bello made the disclosure in Abuja while speaking at the seventh edition of the National Security Seminar entitled: “Consolidating on the Gains of Counter Terrorism Operations in Nigeria’’.

    He, however, warned that the insurgents had chosen a wrong place because he was ready to collaborate with the military to rout them out of the state.

    “Kogi is now a haven for Boko Haram, because many of them have relocated to my state.

    “Just last night, four high profile Boko Haram members were arrested in Kogi by the military.

    “I want to assure them that they have chosen a wrong place to relocate, because we will never allow them.

    “We will work together with the armed forces to consolidate on the victory and gains recorded in the North-East,’’ he said.

    The governor commended the military for their efforts at “technically defeating’’ the insurgents in the North-East, and underscored the need to consolidate on the victory to avoid a relapse.

    Bello said the government had actually done a lot in safeguarding lives and property and in reclaiming the territorial integrity of the country.

    The Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III, said that for the nation to consolidate on the gains of counter terrorism operations, national security agencies must work in synergy.

    Abubakar also appealed to the government to look into and implement several suggestions made by experts at previous security seminars held in the country.

    He said it was high time the government developed the political will to implement suggestions proffered by experts to prevent making security seminars mere talk shows.

    Meanwhile, Brig.-Gen. Jonathan Temlong, the President, Alumni Association of National Defence College, described terrorism as a global threat that had affected over 65 million globally.

    He commended the armed forces for the victory recorded against the Boko Haram, but emphasised the need to brace up and consolidate on the exploit in order to put a final end to the threat.

    NAN reports that the seminar is jointly organised by the National Defence College of Nigeria, the Office of the National Security Adviser and the Alumni Association of National Defence College. (NAN)

  • Five killed as gunmen invade police stations in Kogi, Edo

    A gang of gunmen early yesterday raided a police station at Eika in the Okehi Local Government Area of Kogi State, killing two policemen on duty and a detainee.

    They, thereafter, set the police station ablaze.

    Also felled was a community leader, Mallam Sadiq Obomi.

    The 10-man gang, sources said yesterday, invaded the community in two vehicles at about  1am, shooting indiscriminately, as they moved in the direction of the police station.

    An eyewitness said the two policemen were shot at close range.

    The fire set on the building also consumed motorcycles parked on the premises.

    After accomplishing their mission at the police station, the gunmen moved to Obomi’s house and shot him dead.

    The entire operation in the town lasted about two hours with no one challenging them.

    Armed military men were later drafted to the community to forestall any further attack.

    The Kogi State Police Commissioner (CP), Abdullahi Chafe, confirmed the attack.

    In a related development, suspected cultists have attacked a police station at Ibillo in the Akoko-Edo Local Government Area of Edo State and set free two of their colleagues who were held for alleged rape.

    The attackers, who were said to have gained access into the police station by posing as relatives of the suspects, allegedly fired gunshots sporadically to scare away the people around.

    A woman was said to have been shot dead by a stray bullet.

    The attackers were said to have successfully freed their colleague before running away.

    Confirming the report, the state Commissioner of Police, Haliru Gwandu, said the incident happened on February 2.

    Gwandu said some suspects had been arrested in connection with the incident.

    He said more men had been deployed to the affected police station to ensure that such incident does not occur again.

     ”Two rapists were arrested at Ibillo, and unknown to the police, the suspects were cultists. Their members went to the police station, but the police did not know they were there to rescue their members,” the police boss said.

     

  • Gunmen attack Kogi police station, kill two policemen, detainee

    Some gunmen in the early hours of Friday, attacked a police station at Eika community in Okehi Local Government Area of Kogi, killing two policemen and a detainee.

    The News Agency of Nigeria ( NAN) gathered that the bandits invaded the police station at about 1 am and immediately opened fire on policemen on duty, killing them, alongside a detainee

    The heavily armed hoodlums, said to be about 10, later set the station ablaze and proceeded to the house of  Mr Sadiq Obomi, Chairman, Eika Community Development Association, and killed him.

    The State  Commissioner of Police, Mr Abdulahi Chafe, confirmed the incident , promising to provide details later.

    However, a resident of Eika community who is also a member of a local vigilante group, told NAN that the gunmen came in two vehicles and started shooting into the air as they made their way to the police station.

    He said that the gunmen later escaped after the operation, which he said, lasted almost two hours.

    Security men have been deployed to the community to maintain peace. ( NAN)

  • Six travellers kidnapped in Kogi

    Six travellers kidnapped in Kogi

    •Curfew imposed

    Six passengers travelling from Abuja to Onitsha in Anambra State have been kidnapped in Okene Local Government of Kogi State.
    It was learnt the incident occurred yesterday at Achoze village, about 6:30a.m.
    A source said 10 armed men blocked the vehicle and ordered the passengers out.
    The driver, said the source, abandoned the vehicle and ran into the bush, while the abductors shot into the air.
    One of the passengers, who preferred anonymity, said she escaped by the grace of God.
    She said some of the passengers were injured while escaping, adding that they reported the incident to the police in Okene.
    Spokesman Williams Ayah confirmed the incident.
    He said the police would rescue the victims.
    Okene Local Government Administrator Mallam Abdulrazaq Muhammad has imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew.
    He said the decision was taken because of increase in killing and kidnapping, adding that commercial motorcyclists were barred from operating between 6a.m. and 6p.m.

  • Kogi varsity workers begin indefinite strike

    Kogi State University chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), last Friday, began an indefinite strike.

    The striking workers called for the reconstitution of the university’s Governing Council and payment of arrears owed members. They alleged that about 200 of them have not received salaries in eight months.

    The Chairman, Dr. Daniel Aina, who addressed a news conference at the weekend in Lokoja, maintained that the absence of the governing council in the last one year affected the school negatively.

    He said: “In the last one year, we have struggled with the government on issues relating to the smooth running of the university. We will, however, not fail to appreciate the government for responding in part, by the paying in instalments, arrears of Earned Academic Allowances (EAA). This shows that the government has the capacity to meet its obligations to the university.

    “ASUU-KSU has sought to have audience with the Visitor but we have been denied the opportunity. Our demands have been forwarded to government but there has been no formal response. We have cried out to the world about the deteriorating situation in Kogi State University, the climax of which is the mass exodus of choice lecturers.

    “The hardships meted to the perceived “ghosts” or “improper” workers are needless because even the law deems everyone innocent until proven guilty.

    “The conduct of the screening exercise is alien to the university system and ASUU-KSU has resolved never to be subjected to such unethical practice again.

    “We had wanted the ‘No pay, No Work’ action but we were cajoled. No more shall this happen again.

    “In the last five years, funds committed for infrastructural development is not up to a quarter of what came through the TETFund intervention, which in itself is a product of ASUU struggle.

    “We are tired of working without salary; we are tired of seeing our legacy progressively destroyed through the systematic erosion of the university’s autonomy. We are standing up to oppose oppression and impunity. We are not politicians. We are the vanguard of academic integrity.”

  • Kogi’s three labyrinthine panels

    Kogi’s three labyrinthine panels

    IN a move designed to exorcise ghost workers from the Kogi State payroll, an exercise so simple and direct ordinarily, the state’s youthful but overwhelmed governor, Yahaya Bello, opted to arm three panels and made a hash of each. Staff verification exercises are an indication of the lassitude and incompetence of Nigerian administrators. Yet, each state and each organisation that has embarked on such exercises, despite inflicting pain and punishment on workers, has managed to pull it off in just one try. It is not rocket science. But in the case of Kogi State, Mr Bello first twice failed in pulling it off. He is now in his third try, and all indications are that given the complications he has introduced into it, not to say his general lack of altruism and enthusiasm, he will fail yet again. The reason is that with every incompetent attempt to verify the genuine staff on the state’s payroll, the governor manages to swaddle the exercise with increasing complications and chaos.

    By his own admission, Mr Bello has done little else worthy of media attention or celebration in his one underwhelmed year in office. It seems his major goal is to cut the state’s staff strength without alarming workers and their families about his real objective of retrenching workers. Lacking in courage and savvy, the governor has thus embarked on a clumsy rigmarole that is taking him through the inextricable and unending labyrinth of staff verification exercises. He is immersed in his third try, and counting, in just one year, with none of the three exercises concluded. There is nothing to indicate that this third effort will end well.

    He began the exercise in February last year after he assumed office, by appointing a former army general, Paul Okutimo, to ferret out the ghosts and put the spectral beings in the furnace where they rightly belonged. A few months into the exorcism, the state and the governor’s ears were deafened by complaints of such severity that it was impossible to ignore. The committee, whose other members totalled 16, was immediately adjudged as incompetent and disbanded and replaced by another one headed by Jerry Agbagi. Both committees could not put even one foot right, let alone forward. But it nonetheless fumbled a report to the government in July. Hunger ravaged the state, and workers groaned. Yet, despite the disaffection the staff audit caused and the hardship and deaths, no one complained that a verification exercise was not needed. They only demanded that the state get its act together.

    But of all the remedial steps needed, the state believed it only needed to empanel a new group to redo what the Okutimo/Agbagi-led committees botched. Kogi workers dutifully presented themselves and their dog-eared certificates before the second committee, praying for a quick conclusion and resolution of their salary maladies. The din over the second panel headed by Yakubu Yusuf Okala, leading 24 other panellists, was even much louder and ghoulish. It was no longer clear what the problem was. Was it that the committees were expected to work to a preconceived answer wherein the state’s staff strength would be considerably reduced from the estimated total workforce of 86,000? To do this, the committees would naturally need to be arbitrary and brutal. It achieved both, either by unfair and malevolent design or by incompetent and humiliating juxtapositions, claiming to have uncovered 22,738 ghosts, nearly the staff strength of the state tier of the civil service.

    To muffle the complaints and be seen as doing something to give workers some redress, Mr Bello has once again empanelled a new 32-man committee headed by J.Y. Ayuba, a director of studies from the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria (ASCON). The governor designated the new panel as Staff Screening Complaints Appeal Committee. If the ordinary Kogite wondered why such a simple exercise as staff verification needed an expert from outside, he would be even more nonplussed by the composition of this third and exasperating panel. In the panel are an observer from Gombe State, another observer from Kaduna State, yet another so-called independent observer from Zamfara State, and another one from the same Kaduna State bringing the number from that last state to two. Who ever heard of any state staff screening and verification exercise so ponderous and so foolishly ‘nationally or regionally representative’?

    Mr Bello is obviously overwhelmed by an office and position he merely fooled around with during the campaigns. He was of course shooed aside almost as soon as he indicated interest in the job, for neither he himself nor anyone else took him serious. He knew he had no accomplishment to recommend him to the office. And he knew he was so utterly devoid of talent to face the arduous task of statecraft. Therefore, when circumstances foisted him on the state in 2016, he sensibly surrounded himself with mediocrities who would not gnaw at his conscience by reminding him, through an open show of their talents and qualifications, that he was an intellectual and administrative pygmy. But it is the consequent pygmification of Kogi State that has led to confusion and repetition of the verification exercises, delayed or haphazard payment of salaries, stultification of the civil service, and general retrogression of the state. As long as Mr Bello reigns over the state, for that is what he is really doing, Kogi will continue to stagnate.

  • Kogi’s misplaced priorities

    Kogi’s misplaced priorities

    SIR: Whoever advised Governor Yahaya Bello that prioritizing developmental projects at the expense of the well-being of workers is unwise, an enemy of the state and government. The past days has witnessed misplacement of priority and lack of feeling and respect for workers in the state who are experiencing the most dehumanizing condition since creation of the state.

    Kogi workers were subjected to the most gruesome torture and unnecessary hardship in the last one year all in the name of screening that would never end. Workers who had to travel from long distances across the state to be screened did so at their own financial expense and risk of their lives, just as a number of accidents were recorded with lives lost. The state government had couple of days ago constituted a “screening appeal committee” – another round of an unending exercise. Some persons have said jokingly that after the screening appeal committee finishes their job, the state government will still inaugurate a screening supreme committee. For many Kogites, this is only but another ploy and tactics by the state government to delay the payment of genuine workers for a few more months, waste the state’s money on paying needless allowances to the individuals who have been picked and continue to put workers through the stress of having to travel around on empty stomach to be screened for the umpteenth time.

    Getting priorities right is the hallmark of a sane and a competent government. That is the reason why Governor Akinwumi Ambode of Lagos stands out amongst his peers. Kebbi State has become the modern rice hub of the nation. Taraba State has become a rallying point in terms of modern tea production and Kwara State has remained the most peaceful state in the federation. Subjecting the state’s workforce to abject poverty and severe hunger only to be gallivanting around and flagging off projects has exposed the fact that the Yahaya Bello administration is one that is inhumane and lacked the capacity to get its priorities right.

    How does the government expect people who find it extremely difficult to feed, workers who cannot afford to pay their light bills, medical bills not to talk of paying the school fees of their children and wards to appreciate any construction of projects? Given the nature of Kogi State as a civil service one, any right thinking person should know and understand that the best and only way to put smiles on the faces of the people is through prompt payment of worker’s salaries and pensions. Many workers have lost their lives during the last marathon screening and many more lives may be lost in days to come when the so-called “screening appeal committee” finally commences work.

     

    • Hussain Obaro,

    oseniobaro@yahoo.com

  • Is Bello’s agenda on course in Kogi?

    Is Bello’s agenda on course in Kogi?

    Mixed reactions are trailing the implementation of Kogi State Governor Yahaya Bello’s ‘New Direction’ as he marks his first year in office. How far has he gone in fostering socio-economic and political development of the Confluence State? Correspondent JAMES AZANIA examines the activities of the governor in the last one year.

    When Governor Yahaya Bello took his oath of office as the governor of Kogi State on January 27, last year, no one was left in doubt that rocky days lay ahead. This is not only because of the circumstances surrounding his election, but also due to the indication he gave in his inaugural address that he was ready to tackle the old order, in his determination.
    At the Confluence Stadium Lokoja, venue of his inauguration, the governor unveiled plans to authenticate the number of workers on government’s payroll, initiate reforms in the civil service and ensure probity in the public sphere. These, in a predominantly civil servants’ propelled economy, engendered panic, even some permanent secretaries were directed to proceed on their accumulated annual leave within the second week of the unfolding of the New Direction agenda mantra. At the inauguration were the labour leaders, who were battle-ready, owing to a backlog of issues they had with Bello’s predecessor, Idris Wada.
    Bello may have foreseen their anger. He donated two 18-seater buses to them, which made them to soft-pedal, even though the Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Onuh Edoka, was harangued to go ahead and read the fiery speech they had prepared. But, the bite was no longer there; as the gift took the shine off their immediate problems.
    But, there was also the lingering imbroglio in the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state. This eventually culminated in the vote-of-no confidence passed on him by the Alhaji Haddy Ametuo-led State Executive Committee. Bello also opened other ‘war fronts’, including the inauguration of a committee to oversee the screening of workers or the verification exercise. The fallout of the exercise has continued to generate controversy.
    Bello equally set up a commission of enquiry to probe the past administrations of former governors Ibrahim Idris and Wada. This development also ruffled some feathers.
    Thus, in the course of the year, the efforts of the Bello administration in the areas of development appear to have been overshadowed by controversies, including the prolonged battle in the House of Assembly, over the choice of Speaker. This was finally laid to rest after months of acrimony.
    Opinions are divided about the performance of the administration in the last one year. Some people are of the opinion that the administration has been working assiduously to make Kogi a better place, while others are disappointed over what they consider the state of inertia in the last one year.
    To the pro-Bello group, it is only the perceived enemies of the state that have refused to see the strides achieved so far. But those against, including the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), see him as an autocrat that brusque no dissent.
    For example, at one of its stakeholders’ meeting last year in Lokoja, the PDP said it will not be intimidated in the face of the hardship confronting Kogites, saying that the state at present is in the hands of tyrants.
    At a stakeholders’ meeting of the Kogi West Senatorial district, held at the Rekiya Ogheha Place, some PDP members accused the administration of lacking regard for human lives, saying citizens are dying by the day, from common ailments, due to non-payment of their salaries. They said after a critical look of the APC government in the state that it is obvious that it came to spread poverty, hardship and sickness, because hundreds of people are dying on a daily basis, due to poor economic management and insensitivity on the part of the administration.
    The Director-General, Media and Publicity to Governor Bello, Mr Kingsley Fanwo, however accused the PDP of being the architect of the rot in Kogi.
    He accused the previous PDP administrations of being responsible for the rot the Bello administration is trying to clean, saying that the last PDP government left the state civil service morally broken, with workers not receiving salaries for months.
    Fanwo said: “It is quite paradoxical; someone defecated on the floor and then turn around to blame the person parking it of being slow. We are aware that certain leaders are trying to gang up to stifle the resolve of the present administration to refocus the state and reset our prospect as a people. Governor Yahaya Bello is not expecting the PDP to be happy with his reforms and resolve to question previous administrations over how the commonwealth of the people was managed.”
    He said Bello instituted the staff verification exercise to weed out thousands of ghost workers that were smuggled into the payroll of the state under the PDP administration.
    He added: “When did the PDP become the advocates of the people they owed many months’ salaries? The PDP said that Kogi State has been turned into a punching bag by the APC.”|
    But, the PDP insists that: “the Yahaya Bello administration is heartless, inconsiderate, insensitive, and irresponsive to the plights of Kogi civil servants. It has utterly failed the people as it is bereft of what to do to move the state forward.”
    The party accused the APC of running a government of deceit and blackmail, saying that the new direction policy agenda of the Bello administration was aimed at strangulating the masses and making the poor poorer. It added that almost a year of the administration that nothing has been achieved, except “the rudderless screening”.
    It condemned the frequent foreign trips of the governor, describing it as a flagrant abdication of his responsibility to give quality leadership and good governance.
    Present at that meeting were former Deputy Chief of Staff in the presidency, Prince Sola Akanmode; former Secretary to the State Government, Chief Sola Ojo; former PDP state chairman, Chief Hassan Salawu; Hon. Henry Ojuola and Chief Kola Ojo, among others.
    Protests have continued to greet the outcome of the workers’ screening and verification, with the Joint Action Committee (JAC) of the higher institutions put on hold, shutting down the various campuses in protest against alleged non payment of salaries.
    Even in the APC, there is division within the ranks of members, with its deputy governorship candidate of the party in the last governorship election, Hon. James Faleke, said there could not be any reconciliation without justice.
    Faleke said he had never been involved in any reconciliation process with the government, because of the injustice perpetrated by the party. He spoke in Ogonicha, Ofu Local Government, at the one year remembrance ceremony for the late governorship candidate, Prince Abubakar Audu.
    He said the logjam in the Kogi APC cannot be resolved, because of the way and manner the national leadership handled the issues that were generated following Audu’s death.
    His words: “There can never be any reconciliation in a situation where somebody works from first day to the last day of the month and another person collects his salary. What can only be the basis for reconciliation is for the salary to be returned; that is the only reconciliation. We are prepared to go hungry for the next four years, but I can tell you that God sparing our lives, the song will change surely.”
    Faleke said every “right-thinking person knows that the problem in the APC was a fallout” from the manner with which the national secretariat of the party handled the crisis following Audu’s death.
    The former deputy governorship candidate noted that the development had affected the party negatively. He said: “The architects of the crisis in Kogi State started the imminent downfall of our party, the APC. The way and manner the issue of Kogi was handled was least expected of a political party. I have heard that one of the cabals said that the APC was just a gathering of some people, not yet a political party. I want to say that as far as what happened in Kogi State is concerned and how it is affecting the party, I am sure those in government can confirm that, all is not well within the party, because when you worked and some people are benefitting or reaping the fruits of your labour, they will know that all cannot be well and that is why they are not getting it right.
    “It is one year after Audu and nothing seems to be moving; it has taken the state more than seven to eight months to screen workers and pay salary. Meanwhile, people have died through queuing or waiting for their names to be screened and those that had been screened have not collected their salary; you can imagine that certainly things are very bad, we know how much we spend to maintain our people, to keep them moving. What happened to us during the case and when we lost our leader one year ago and all the battles we went through in the legal process, the way and manner the court judgments came, the issues that were determined have shown that we are not in a party yet.
    “You know that this party was formed by all of us; we contributed to it; it is not an animal farm; it belongs to everybody. It is only when they realise this that this party can move forward. If our people get paid, if our people are empowered and entrenched, I am sure the songs will change. But, as it is now, it is bad song.”
    Academic and non-academic activities were paralysed in the institutions, as workers marched round the towns. They accused the government of misconduct and temporarily blocked the Lokoja-Abuja highway with their procession.
    The protest followed the ultimatum given to government by the JAC over the alleged failure to pay some of their members that took part in the verification exercise.
    The chairman of the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic (ASUP), Sunday Boluwomi, accused the government of failure to pay the salaries of about 148 workers.
    He vowed that the committee would embark on a five-day warning strike, if the government failed to meet their demands, adding that at the expiration of the warning strike an indefinite action would follow.
    His words: “If our members are not paid by Monday, we will start five days warning strike and after that we will go for an indefinite one. It is the same students we are protecting that are accusing us; the same NAKOSS are the one that did not hear from us; they have their own parents somewhere and they are collecting salaries, but our members here were not paid for eight months. Many of them have withdrawn their children from school. We cannot train other people’s children when ours are suffering.”
    Boluwomi said it was wrong for government to label members that were available every day, as ghost workers, after going through series of screening.
    He added: “If they say there are ghost workers, we tell them we know genuine workers in our own place and these genuine workers have not been paid. If they have ghost workers, fine. The ones we know are not ghosts. We have more than 135 staff members that have not been paid; they are not ghosts, we know them, and we have their records. You don’t do an endless screening. If you go to some other states that have done screening, it doesn’t take them more than three months and they have results. Going back memory lane, it was Okuntimo that was the chairman (of the screening committee), he was sacked, another person came on board, he was sacked. Okolo is there now and up till today, they don’t have any result.
    He added: “Those people they said are ghost workers or that have problems, they have not been able to identify the reasons why they have not paid them. If a screening committee is set up and you wind up, you said you have concluded your screening, but there should be a report. Up till today, there is no report about Kogi State Polytechnic. The screening cannot be endless; there must be time-frame that you carry out a particular screening. We want to say that we don’t believe in any screening again; they have done the first one, the second one and the third one. Everything they asked for have been submitted. Yet, no result. So, it cannot be an endless one; it is just a delay tactics to make sure they withdraw people unlawfully.
    “With what is happening now, Kogi State will be drawn back in terms of academic pursuit. Accreditation is coming later this year and it means that all our courses will not be accredited and the implication is that the certificate they are carrying is more or less like fake.”
    Bello claimed last December that he has paid all salaries of workers in Kogi State, following the conclusion of the screening exercise, which kicked-off early 2016.
    At the threshold of Governor Bello as first year in office, the horizon appears a little hazy, just as sections of the populace continue to plead that the administration be given all the support required to move the state forward.

  • Farce and incompetence in Bello’s Kogi

    Farce and incompetence in Bello’s Kogi

    GOVERNOR Yahaya Bello, the so-called digital governor of Kogi State, spent the better part of one year and two successive panels screening the state’s workforce for ghost workers. After he brought the exercise he described as staff verification to an inglorious conclusion a few weeks ago, claiming with fanfare to have discovered over 18,000 ghost workers out of a little over 27,000 state staff roll, it was clear he was working to a predetermined answer. The verification exercise was riddled with contradictions and gross ineptitude, salary payment itself is still haphazard, deductions lack arithmetic and financial coherence, and the governor is engaged in a war of attrition with institutions and agencies for the purpose of getting as many workers as possible struck off the payroll, regardless of extant rules and laws.
    For a government that claims to groan under a monthly wage bill of more than N5bn (they have dishonestly included LG staff salaries), and whose second verification panel claims to have saved the state government about N2.6bn every month, it is incredible that the state still finds it difficult to pay salaries as and when due, not to say pay all workers full salaries at the same time. Kogi obviously operates outside known mathematical laws. And despite the second panel claiming to remedy what the state government described as the first panel’s shoddy verification exercise, it is remarkable that there are still complaints galore among state workers, some of whom, estimated to be nearly half of the workforce, have not been paid for more than six months.
    The governor, it seems, would prefer not to pay any worker at all. Seizing upon the screening panel’s recommendations, but without recourse to either its own terms of reference or the law, the state has asked professors in the state university and chief lecturers in the College of Education, and any other top civil servant, including chief nursing officers in state hospitals, to retire on account of salary and promotional stagnation that have lasted for eight years. In Kogi, the lecturers and directors do not have to reach retirement age, and neither the law nor any other rule matters. What matters is that Mr Bello is obsessed with cutting staff strength by hook or crook or simply not paying them at all using one pretext or the other. He prefers to splurge the state funds on other trifles. The famous roundabouts in Lokoja’s main street that conjured spiritual nightmares in his excitable imagination, and which he destroyed shortly after he assumed office, have remained abandoned. Instead, the restless traveller governor is erecting garish sentry posts on all the access roads to Government House, Lokoja.
    Those who imposed this naïve and dangerously inept governor on Kogi can look back with sadistic pleasure at the consequences of their meddlesomeness. Kogi now groans under a power shift of other people’s making, a shift that is in essence humiliating and disruptive. With no development happening anywhere in the state, and with workers hungry, sick and oppressed, Kogites are in a quandary about what to do to survive the next three years until either God or the ballot box puts paid to the impressionable young governor’s clownishness and propaganda.

  • Kogi workers screening, a sham

    SIR: To many who had questioned the modus operandi of the marathon and unending Kogi State screening exercise, the widespread rejection and protests that greeted the final release of the much awaited and publicised report of the exercise by the state government few days ago wasn’t unexpected; neither was the many contradictions and lacuna therein of any surprise. The screening exercise which would have offered an opportunity for the much needed cleanup and re-organization of the state civil service was turned into a tool for political witch hunting, revenge and vendetta.

    The crisis which led to the removal of the leadership of the former screening committee and his subsequent replacement futher exposed the fact that the Yahaya Bello administration lacks what it takes to conduct a free and fair staff verification exercise. It is perplexing that the same verification/screening exercise which was done in states like Sokoto, Benue, Plateau, Kwara with much bigger staff strength within weeks and few months is taking forever to conclude in Kogi State. It doesn’t require rocket science to know that the bank verification number (BVN) of workers holds the key to a genuine and successful staff audit and that was what all the states used in cleaning up their civil service. Rather than take advantage of ICT and BVN, the state government opted to go the primitive old way which has raised more questions than required of this administration’s hidden agenda to systematically retrench workers under the guise of screening, and the quality of men and women around the governor.

    The screening report as released to the public is not only an embarrassment, it is also shameful. The “new direction” government of a “digital governor” could not even edit and screen its own report before releasing it. How will a serious government declare majority of its workforce who are presently on study leave within and outside the country as “ghosts” in an era where sane governments are waging a war on brain drain? Previous government complied with the commitment to sponsor workers and accademics to study and come back to impact their knowledge to benefit the state in line with international best practice, only for those to be removed from the state’s workforce.

    Amongst the several contradictions and controversies in the screening report, heads of key state owned institutions like the state polytechnics, the state university and many others were either declared “ghosts” or contract staffs.  For me, the most embarrassing point of the screeing report is the fact that some names apeared both in the “cleared” and “uncleared” list of state workers.  Some of the workers who were cleared before were lucky to be in the few that received their salaries up till December 2016 are now tagged as “ghosts”

    Although in their usual manner, the state government has reiterated its commitment to pay all “genuine” workers, stressing that the screeing was an ongoing exercise as aggrieved persons with “genuine” complaints should bring such forward for a redress, the questions on the lips of majority of Kogites are; how long would this screeing exercise go on? Will we even see the end of these perpetual embarrassment, harassment and hardship being meted to the workers under the guise of staff verification in the life span of this administration? What sins have the workers committed against this government to warrant maltreatments and torture?

    It’s good news that the state House of Assembly has finally awaken from its deep “sleep” and rising up to be counted on this matter. An opportunity for them to prove their true representation and loyalty to the people who elected them into office is now.

     

    • Hussain Obaro,

    oseniobaro@yahoo.com