By Abimbola Ogunnaike
Governor of Anambra State, Prof Charles Soludo, has threatened to cut salaries of workers who are absent from work on sit-at-home days in the state.
The Governor gave the threat while addressing Anambra State workforce at May Day celebration held at Dr. Alex Ekwueme square, Awka on Monday, 1 May, 2023.
According to him, Monday sit-at-home has become an excuse for workers to stop coming to work on Mondays, noting that he cannot continue with this attitude of workers
Recently, Soludo had increased workers’ salaries by 10 per cent.
“You cannot be working for just four days a week and earn full salaries. We must get back to working on Monday to the government. If we do not go to work, we must not get our full salary. We must be paid proportionally to number of days we work. If we must continue not attending work on Monday, we must direct Saturday work.
“You must do your work and we cannot be working for 70 per cent and earn 110 per cent. We will cut your salaries when you fail to come to work on Monday,” he said.
The Governor also stated that the state government had been running on N88 billion budget deficit for the past one year.
Soludo, who said the 2023 budget was predicated on N4 billion internally generated revenue every month but the state has been generating only N2 billion, also added that the state was supposed to be getting N5 billion from Federal Government but it is getting less.
He called on the workers to buckle down and work towards generating revenue to the government in order to take care of the workers’ welfare and other sstat’s pressing issues.
The Governor said that there is pressure on him to increase salaries and down size workforce, urging labour leaders to study the proposal.
