The attention of Emohua local government has been drawn to the erroneous impression making rounds that the March 2024 salaries and allowances of staff and appointees are delayed by the executive chairman, Hon. Chidi Julius Lloyd, PhD, DSSRS, MCIArb (UK).
It is important and reasonable to state the matter properly for the understanding of all who have anything to do with Emohua Local Government and the processes that led to the current situation, to avoid any possible doubt:
1. There is a circular or directive from the Permanent Secretary, Rivers State Local Government Service Commission, ordering the Chairman of Emohua Local Government to pay salaries to ghost workers and certain individuals whose employment has been proven to be grossly irregular.
This directive, which in its entirety reduces the position of the Chairman to that of a mere clerk in the civil service, cannot suffice for the pursuit of the true position in this matter.
2. A properly constituted biometric exercise conducted by the local government and supervised by the Local Government Service Commission in 2021 discovered that a great percentage of council resources were passed to ghost workers and those whose employment was irregular.
3. That those who were affected by the council’s intervention proceeded to the National Industrial Court for possible redress and lost their cases.
It must be stressed that the resources retrieved from ghost workers, enabled the council to execute critical projects across the local government area, such as the local government secretariat complex, water projects, the construction of community roads, state-of-the-art medical facilities, and other infrastructure hitherto unknown in the L.G.A.
4. That rather than adhere to the simplest administrative procedure of a possible and acceptable revisit of the action of the Local Government, the Rivers State Local Government Service Commission has taken the principal officers of the Council into hiding.
The HLGA, HPM, and Treasurer, who were squarely part of the biometric exercise, have rather chosen to stay away from the office, with the intent to demonstrate an uncanny commitment to the commission’s undue pursuit of a possible political goal.
5. Finally, it is preposterous and absurd for the Commission, through its Permanent Secretary, to endeavour to malign the Local Government Chairman while exculpating those who were discovered, without equivocation to be irregularly employed, as well as approving the payment of salaries to ghost workers in Emohua Local Government Area.
Emohua Local Government Council is ready to pay salaries and allowances to qualified individuals and institutions, as soon as the hurdles placed on the process are removed by the commission and all the principal officers of the council.
Signed.
Bright Jossy-Elendu
Chief Press Secretary To The Chairman, Emohua Local Government Area.
Saturday, April 20, 2024
