The Chief Press Secretary to the Akwa Ibom State Governor, Mr. Ekerette Udoh, has said that the state government does not owe civil servants salaries.
Udoh, who spoke with our correspondent in Uyo on Wednesday, said it was regrettable that the state was mistakenly lumped into the group of states that owe workers salaries in the national dailies.
He said, “Akwa Ibom State does not owe workers salaries at all. The state was mistakenly lumped into states that owe workers salaries in the national dailies.”
Earlier, the Commissioner for Information and Communications, Mr. Aniekan Umanah, had said that salaries and allowances in the state constitute first line charges.
He stated that by first-line charges, salaries and allowances of workers, irrespective of their levels or grades, were paid first before government attended to any other matters that required money.
“Akwa Ibom State Government does not owe workers salaries. Salary is the first-line charge in Akwa Ibom State,” he said.
Some workers, however, agreed with the CPS and the Information commissioner, saying that the state did not owe core civil servant salaries.
A worker in the Health ministry, who did not want to be named, told our correspondent that the state government had paid them up to May. He added that they were expecting their June salaries.
However, a section of the Akwa Ibom State University workers, said they have not been paid in the last 22 months.
But the Information commissioner, however, disagreed, saying that they were people who had been brought into the system after the budget had been prepared. He added that the state government was trying to regularise their appointments, with a view to including them in the new budget.
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