I’ll pay workers not on strike, Fayose tells labour

Ekiti State Governor, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, has said the state government would pay salaries to only workers who were not on strike from the “little” monthly allocation from Abuja.

The governor also stated that embarking on strike was not the solution to the poor resources available to the government, which had led to irregular payment of salaries in the last few months.

Fayose stated this while featuring on an interview programme on the state-owned radio and television stations in Ado Ekiti, the state capital.

The organised labour had on Thursday began an indefinite strike to press home the demand for the outstanding five months salaries of workers, among other issues.

Fayose however complained that the state was handicapped by the continuous slide in statutory allocations coming to the state and the general economic recession in the country.

He said, “Since I assumed office, every month the allocation paper comes from Abuja, a committee made up of labour leaders and other stakeholders has been the one sharing whatever comes among all sectors. If I am not hiding anything from labour leaders and workers, I expect them to understand. I feel their pain but there is limit to what I can do in this type of situation.

“Workers at the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital under the auspices of JOHESU have written that they are not on strike and people like that will be paid from what came from Abuja.

“Since I have no power to stop workers from going on strike, I wish them well; but we need to understand what the situation is like. They cannot say that I have not consistently been alerting Nigerians since late last year that a time like this is coming. In fact, the next allocation may be smaller than the one we are complaining about now.”