Kaduna To Increase Workers’ Salaries, Says Head Of Service

Nasir El-RufaiCivil servants in Kaduna State will soon have cause to smile following disclosure by the State Government that it will review their salaries to meet current economic realities.

Towards this end, a consultant has already been contracted to look at possible reforms in the Kaduna Civil Service.

“The State would soon come up with a harmonised pay policy that will take cognisance of all the various salary structures in the state with a view to closing the existing salary gap among workers”, said Head of Service in the state, Mrs. Alisabatu Dada-Onaz, yesterday at an interactive session as part of the 2016 civil service week.

She added that “The workers verification exercise, which commenced one year ago, was specifically meant to ascertain the actual figure of workers in the state, before any salary increment would be made”.

According to Mrs. Dada-Onaz, so far, 75, 000 staff have been successfully verified and found to be genuine workers of the state, while about 13, 3236 others were found with various issues in the aftermath of the verification exercise.

The Head of Service, however, said “Those with issues have been asked to write to the state governor and attached all relevant documents to prove they are genuine workers before their name can be included in the state pay role. I assure you that after cleansing the state’s pay role of ghost workers, workers salary would be improved”.

Also speaking, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, Mohammed Mansir said that the government has budgeted N15 billion for capital project in the education sector, adding that public schools were currently being renovated and equipped with furniture and other interventions.

Similarly, his counterpart in the Ministry of Environment, Hajiya Hauwa Umar said that N1.2 billion has been budgeted for management of solid waste alone.