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Saturday, January 20, 2018

I Have No Hand in Local Government Salaries, Please

Last night, I read a comment on my Facebook wall asking me to clear my name on Bauchi State Government’s decision to pay its Local Government employees only their basic salary. Many workers are accusing me of misleading the Governor on the matter. Incidentally, I heard about the cut from a friend earlier in the afternoon when I went to cut my hair around Rwang Pam Street, Jos, yesterday. Few minutes ago, the same friend inboxed me saying that some Local Government workers are even looking for my house to attack me obviously. I promised him to scribble something when I am back from the farm.
Let me say it clearly that I have nothing to do with Local Government salaries in Bauchi State. Nothing, absolutely. My link with Bauchi State Government and the Governor was only the Transition Committee on which I served as Member/Secretary. Since the Committee ended its assignment, I have returned to my routine private life. If any decision is taken about Local Government salaries, I am not privy to it and nobody even informed me about it, not even my Deputy Governor friend, until I heard it on the streets yesterday. It is not my concern now and I will not dabble into it. To this moment, I do not know why the allowances did not accompany the salaries as usual.
My only link with Local Governments in fact was when the Transition Committee sent teams to study their state of governance last month. On that we submitted our last report. Nowhere in that report was it mentioned that workers be paid less their allowances. Nowhere.
The other possible link is the just concluded verification exercise of State Government workers, not Local Government, workers. Even there, my role was limited to advising the Governor on the need for the exercise and suggesting the expert that would carry out the work. The expert has done his work within the stipulated 21 days and submitted same to the government, without even any resort to me, though his payment came through the Transition Committee. His jurisdiction, according to his terms of reference, did not include Local Governments, LEAs and SUBEB. That is why he has not covered them.
I think the resentful workers should direct their anger away from me, poor Dr. Tilde, whom they are purporting to be the closest person to the Governor. I wonder! The Governor is a person that was twice a Commissioner among other qualifications that includes being a lawyer for decades. He has a Deputy with whom he is working closely, and an SSG that was in that position twice before, an Accountant General and a Permanent Secretary on LG Affairs, both appointees of the former administration and who continue to remain in their positions in direct contact with the Governor. What could Dr. Tilde, who is not even a government employee, be in the equation of Local Government employee’s salaries?
I think also the government will do itself justice by explaining to the Local Government workers why the allowances were not paid. The need for the appointment of a press secretary cannot be overemphasized. The absence of anyone in that position is creating an unnecessary and dangerous vacuum. I believe in the doctrine of consultation and information flow in public affairs. People need not only to be consulted but also informed on matters that concern them. These are keystones in both Islamic and secular administration. Otherwise, what will prevail is the Arabic saying that man is an enemy of what he does not know.
I am not unaware though that many people, politicians and civil servants alike, are afraid of seeing Dr. Tilde close to the governor. These are people that are responsible for the unfortunate State that Bauchi has found itself. They want the status quo of free for all theft to continue. I remember how one of them rushed to my office to advise me against the verification exercise because it will expose his deals at the payroll section. While his eyes bulged before me, he was warning me that I have children who will in future become targets of rancor and evil. I told him right away that I do not pray that any of my children to work in government – so they will be beyond the reach of any evil servant. I will not wonder if people like him are going about Bauchi instigating workers against me and against change. And Bauchi is such a small place that is highly vulnerable to gossip an evil.
The old thieves and their agents are even going about town telling people that Buhari has given the Governor N11 bn to pay salaries. Where will Buhari, who is also struggling with an empty treasury, get the N11 bn to dish out to any state? Why would he treat Bauchi different from other states? He has repeatedly told the governors to return to their states and find ingenious ways of raising revenues. But Bauchi is a place where anything goes. Just fabricate any lie and thousands of the workers and ordinary people are ever ready to willingly swallow it, hook, line and sinker. I pity Bauchi State, sincerely.
While I advised the government above on the need for more consultation and information flow, I have a word of advice to workers in Bauchi too. It is to their benefit to get on board and help the new Governor to cleanse the payroll. The present payroll cannot just hold. A State that receives only N2.5billion as federal allocation cannot sustain a payroll of N2.6billion. This is common sense. The payroll of over 35,000 ‘workers’ must be cleansed of the excesses that befell it in the past eight years. Ghost workers and undeserved beneficiaries like family members of permanent secretaries, directors and other influential civil servants under different disguises must be dealt away with before the real worker can be assured of an unimpeded flow of his salary. The new reality is: Hey guys! The party is over.
It is also over for Local Government administrators that have been stealing stupendous amount of our public wealth through endless number of ghost workers. Their workers should support government to fish out the illegal entries that will continue to threaten their legitimate pays. Only doing so will solve the present mess, not targeting Dr. Tilde.
Thank you.
Dr. Aliyu U. Tilde

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