As representatives of 21 Peoples Democratic Party [PDP]
governors mounted the rostrum Saturday night at the presidential villa in Abuja
to announce N1.05 billion in donation to the PDP, back in their respective
states, school teachers and other state workers were enduring their second or third
month of work without pay, Premium Times reports.
In some states, the indebtedness to workers stretched a
year. In Ebonyi, authorities owed teachers under the Universal Basic Education
scheme nearly 12 months of salaries.
In Abia State, secondary school teachers were last paid in
August, while primary school teachers have been owed since October.
In Akwa Ibom State, the nation’s leading oil producer which
draws more than triple of what other states receive from the federation account
monthly, local government staff were on strike. Before the strike, they were
forced to receive half salaries for several months, while authorities claimed
they had no money.
In Cross River, the situation had worsened after months of
indebtedness that state-run television, the Cross River Broadcasting
Corporation, CRBC, shut off production last week.
The station remains off air till date. Other staff fortunate
to have received reasonably up-to-date pay, have yet to be paid for November.
But on Saturday night, Cross State governor, Liyel Imoke,
stood next to his Bauchi State colleague, Isa Yuguda, as Mr. Yuguda announced to
a gleeful president and a shocked nation how the 21 governors who had been
struggling to pay salaries long before the present oil crisis, rallied N50
million each in donation to the PDP.
“We may do more in future, but that is what we were able to
raise for now,” Mr. Yuguda assured.
In all, the PDP and the president raked in over N21 billion,
with donations coming from government contractors, nameless associates, and
Tunde Ayeni, the head of Skye Bank, who has bought a string of government
assets, including the mega telecoms carrier, NITEL/MTEL, in a process that has
already become controversial.
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