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Meeting with a senior friend of mine in Okpo, Olamaboro LGA, working under the Olamaboro Local Government until being declared Ghost by Governor Yahaya Bello-led Appeal Screening Committee.
Telling me his ordeal and how things had being difficult for him since the incident and how he haven’t being paid like hundreds of others that suffered same faith over 13 months before being sack makes me to ask him the reason why he was declared ghost or sack?
He told me he was tag by the screening committee as a DIASPORA WORKER.
From the founding of the appeal screening committee submitted to the governor they tag a Diaspora worker as someone “Cheating the government by earning salary without working as evidence by consistent cash withdrawals in location outside the state or outside the staff primary place of assignment”.
That lead me to asking this simple question.
What’s the fate of the workers under Olamaboro LGA withdrawing their money at banks located at Otukpa, Ugbokolo, Lokoja and Ankpa and their are still referring them as Diaspora Staff and as a result of that sack them and putting them in an untold hardship condition in Olamaboro when Olomabaro as a Local government had no commercial bank?
Where do you the government expect those people to withdraw their money?
Is it their fault that the bad leadership that had being in place in Olamaboro for the past 12 years failed in making Olamaboro an economic attractive area to attract commercial banks to Okpo?
According to recommendation made by the appeal committee as quoted in their report “Absence from work without leave (Diaspora Workers)
According to PSR 030402(e) absence from duty without leave is serious misconduct which when proved is punishable with dismissal.
Staff who proved through satisfactory and cogent evidence that he/she was indeed, at his/her duty post was cleared.
Some public servants who came under this head tried to absolve themselves of the charge by claiming that they were sick and were admitted to hospitals or herbal homes outside their respective places of primary assignment hence their persistent withdrawals in those places. While the Committee empathized with these class of Civil Servants, they were unable to present medical reports documenting their ailments or records from the hospitals where they claimed to have been admitted. Secondly, majority of these officers failed to formally inform their offices of their ailments and were therefore adjudged to be away on sick leave without approval.
The Committee hereby recommends that those Staff who have been adjudged to be away from duty without official leave be disciplined in accordance with the provisions of PSR 030402(e)”.
The above failed to express the situation of this set of workers being victimised in Olamaboro LGA, that’s “people withdrawing their money from Otukpa Branch, Ugbokolo, Lokoja and Ankpa and still been referred to as Diaspora Staff in Olamaboro”
Since my able governor Alhaji Yaya Bello is in the pardoning spirit of pardoning some civil servant and pensioners being declared Ghost even as they are still living with responsibility to cater for. I urge him in the sake of equity and fairness to pardon this set of workers facing an unjust fate.
God bless Kogi state.
Robert Arome Eboh
0813828138313
Abuja
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