Reprieve came the way of civil servants in Benue State as the Governor, Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia, fulfilled his promise to commence payment of salary as from June 25, 2023.
Workers in Benue State last received salary in November, 2022, while they were also owed arrears of five months in 2017 which the then governor, Samuel Ortom, promised to pay but defaulted.
The backlog of salary arrears was one of the factors responsible for the loss of Ortom-led Peoples Democratic Party in the last general elections.
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Alia had, in his Democracy Day broadcast, promised to start payment of salary as from June 25.
A cross-section of workers, who spoke to our correspondent on Monday, expressed joy and commended the governor for honouring his words.
A staff member in the Ministry of Works, Tony Msugh,said, “I thank the governor for fulfilling his promise. Do you know that people started receiving alert since Sunday, which some of us never expected?
“Our prayer is that the state should not have the kind of leader we had in the past eight years.”
The Benue State Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress, Terungwa Igbe, also hailed the governor for honouring his words.
“We want to thank His Excellency for keeping his promise,” the labour leader said in an interview with our correspondent.
Also, a worker in the Local Government Service Commission, Bernard Achue, commended the governor for honouring his promise to pay.
“At the time he made the promise during his broadcast on June 12 that workers would begin to receive alert as from June 25, some of us did not take it seriously, especially when the day fell on Sunday.
“Surprisingly, some workers actually started receiving alert yesterday (Sunday) but I received mine this (Monday) morning. I thank God for giving us a man of God and I pray he continues like this.
“You may not understand the reason we are so happy. Many people have lost their lives due to lack of money to go to hospital,” Achua said.
(Punch)
