Ebira Must Be Better (EMBB) group has urged the Kogi state government to prioritise payment of teachers and councils workers above execution of capital projects in order to alleviate the suffering of the affected workers.
The President of the group, Comrade Danfulani Ohinoyi Lukman disclosed this to newsmen in Lokoja yesterday.
According to him, “the state government should be ready to forgo any other thing for the sake of education”.
He said, “No capital project is far more important than the education of our children. Government ought to be worried that teachers in Basic Schools are not paid salaries. Teachers are the engine room of development in
any country and should not be played with”
The group also advised the government to put on hold capital projects, especially non-revenue- yielding ones, to
enable it clear salary arrears of teachers at all level.
The state governor, Alhaji Yahaya Adoza Bello, had at several fora said the payment of Kogi civil servants is his the priority of his government.
Teachers in both primary and post-primary schools in the state are being owed salaries while workers in the 21 local
government councils in the state who have went through series of screening exercise and was cleared have yet to be paid for months now.
The EMBB lamented the rot in both primary and junior secondary schools across the state due to non-payment of
teachers’ salaries for many months now.
Comrade Danfulani also urged the state and local governments to begin the implementation of a priority expenditure scheme that put the payment of teachers’ salaries in the same range as security, “We should rise to condemn the continuous owing of teachers. Why should teachers’ salary be the last to be paid,’’ he said.
