Nasarawa Took N28bn Bank Loans In Five Years – NLC

The Nasarawa State chapter of the Nigeria Labour Congress says the state government has so far collected the sum of N28bn as loan from various commercials banks from the month of June 2011 till date.

The state chairman of the Joint Public Service Negotiation Council, Mr. Yusuf Sarki, who spoke on behalf of the NLC and Trade Union Congress, disclosed this to Saturday PUNCH shortly after the state administrative and state executive council meeting held at the Labour House in Lafia.

Sarki, who doubles as NLC leader, said the aim of the meeting was to take a decision on the ongoing industrial action embarked upon by the two unions. He said it was also to suspend the first vice-chairman of the state chapter of the NLC, Mr. Abdullahi Abubakar, for allegedly betraying the organised labour in its struggle to fight for the entire civil servants in the state.

“In the meeting, we looked at the issues and the action that the suspended member exhibited and we felt it was a kind of ill health to labour movement in the state. It is un-healthy and unconstitutional. As such, members of the state administrative and executive council unanimously agreed that, based on his actions, he should be suspended indefinitely from the NLC.

He said, “We also educated some of our affiliates, whom the state government is trying to use to divide us in the struggle.

“What we are asking the state government is that it should pay us our salaries. We are not concerned whether the state government is going to execute any project in the state. We have not been paid our annual increments and our promotion is being delayed.”

The state government will continue to collect loans as our allocations will continue to reduce from the highest to the lowest.”

Reacting to his suspension in a telephone interview with Saturday PUNCH in Lafia, Abubakar said he did not care.

Source:- Punchng