Plateau State is a State that is supposed to hold its head
high anytime issues of financial obligations to workers
arise. This is because of the preponderance of resources
both human and natural that dot its landscape. Given a
fair exploitation of mineral resources in the state as it is
done in states with crude oil, Plateau State should by now
be enjoying enormous availability of finance to settle its
civil servants as and when due without any snag.
But the over-concentration on oil has left states like
Plateau relying almost solely on allocations from the
federal level to meet with its numerous obligations. This
is coupled with the fact that successive administrations
have done little or nothing to develop the enormous
tourism and other potentials of the state.
Consequently, the state, just like many others even
including oil producing ones, has suffered gross
shortage in its income that its obligations are hardly met
as the needs keep soaring in galloping-geometrical rate.
Because of this, salaries of workers were not paid and
pension of retirees were also not paid over time, leaving
a backlog of obligations to clear.
However, at the assumption of office on May 29, 2015,
the government of Simon Bako Lalong, made not only the
payment of salaries of workers and pensioners a
priority, he also took the issue of clearing the backlogs
he met on ground seriously.
There is no gainsaying the fact that the governor
inherited a badly battered and demoralized civil service,
including dehumanized pensioners owing to non-payment
of entitlements to them for quite a long time, a situation
that led to a statewide strike by the workers, leaving
government and governance to suffer almost
irredeemably with its attendant negative effects on the
state and its people.
To ensure that the situation is reversed and that workers
return to work, the Lalong administration put in place
some radical cost-cutting measures for all government
officials with the aim of redistributing the saved sum to
defray the backlog of entitlements owed workers in the
state.
Part of this extreme cost-cutting measure was the
deliberate refusal of the governor to move into the new
government house but choose to live in the old one which
is far lesser in cost to maintain and service than if he
had moved into the new one.
The other one is the massive cut down on official travels
abroad by government officials except in cases where
such travels are extremely important, justifiable given the
current economic situation and have the potential of
making an almost immediate positive impact on the
state’s economy. The number of those who also travel
with the governor when it is extremely necessary for him
to do so has also been reduced very significantly.
Also, the government embarked on biometrics exercise
for civil servants and pensioners in the state with the aim
of weeding out ghost workers and pensioners from its
payroll, an exercise that paid off bountifully as
government now save some handsome sum monthly
from the ghosts detected in that exercise. The sum so
saved is ploughed back into settling the wages of genuine
workers.
All these show the governor’s genuine commitment to
the welfare of workers and pensioners in the state.
Despite the well documented dwindling resources of the
nation that has also adversely affected allocations to
states, Lalong was able to clear workers’ salaries and
pensioners’ gratuities significantly enough for the
workers who had before the inauguration of the current
administration embarked on an indefinite strike action
which crippled the state and brought other economic
activities to their knees to call off the industrial action.
In addition to this, staff of the state broadcast
corporation, PLRTV, and those of the judiciary, earlier
sacked by the previous administration, were recalled by
Lalong
A lot of the civil servants who had not been promoted for
up to 8 to ten years were promoted accordingly. The
implication of this is that a majority of them received
triple promotion and were paid fully for the years lost in
line with the entitlements that come with each level of
promotion up to date.
All these were done despite the fact that they would
eventually add to the state’s wage bill and further strain
the already drained resources of the state. But Lalong
knowing full well as a seasoned administrator that human
capital management and development are the best way to
get other resources useful for the state, determined not
to leave any stone unturned in his drive to ensure that
workers get their entitlements as and when due.
He once reminded some top government officials that
when a worker is owed his/her entitlement, a whole
family is owed and that this could lead to the unintended
disintegration of families and its negative impact on the
society at large, hence, his passion to make workers’
welfare his priority no matter the cost.
Although government has had to borrow some of the
funds with which it used to defray workers’ and
pensioners’ outstanding entitlements, it is indeed still a
worthy venture as long as the purpose of borrowing
these funds is noble, achieved and is properly accounted
for.
While this writer takes cognizance of the fact that the
Lalong administration has received bailout funds and
Paris Club refund, it is also a known fact that while these
funds are one-off in coming, the settlement of wage bills
of the past does not preclude the continuous payment of
salaries and pensions every month by the state. Another
fact is that there are one thousand and one things
desperately calling for government attention among
which is the billions of naira owed contractors which
have also been significantly settled while new projects
have to also be funded for the benefit of the state and its
people.
This is in addition to almost 500 new pensioners added to
the wage bill of the state.
Furthermore, there are guidelines set by the federal
government on what percentage of the funds can be
spent on recurrent obligations and what percentage can
be spent on capital obligations. It is gratifying to know
that despite the doubts expressed by some people on the
prudent utilization of these and other funds accrued to
the state, anti-graft agencies have visited the state to
check the books and found nothing untoward in the
administration of the funds by Lalong. They gave Lalong
a clean bill of health unlike the negative verdicts they
returned on some other state governors where they had
gone to carry out the similar audits.
In all these, Plateau State workers are among the
happiest in the country, thanks to a man of conscience,
honour and integrity we have as governor. The situation
is so good for both workers and pensioners in the state
that Simon Lalong has been nicknamed #governoralert, a
nickname that comes from the very fact that the workers
and pensioners receive bank alert of payments of their
monthly entitlements into their accounts on a regular
basis, as and when due.
With a good manager of resources at the helm of
affairs, it is only expected that workers and pensioners
in Plateau State will continue to prosper under Lalong
even if resources seem to be scarce.
