Abia State Receives N3 Billion Bailout Fund to Offset Salary Arrears -Emezue
Felix Okoye
Abia State Government has received N3 billion as its own share of the bailout fund released by the federal government to enable states pay off the backlog of salary arrears.
The Special Assistant to the governor on media, Ugochukwu Emezue, disclosed this news to newsmen in Umuahia, at the weekend.
According to him, the money was just about half of the total amount of salary arrears owed workers, which is about N6 billion.
“The government has received the bailout fund, it is in the neighbourhood of N3 billion. Abia needs about N6 billion to clear the arrears. The money is here and Governor Okezie Ikpeazu is looking inwards to augment the money and clear the arrears”, he said.
Emezue stated further that the current salaries were being paid but acknowledged that “some agencies have not received theirs”.
This in his opinion, he said, “The reason is that government is carrying out workers verification; the workers that have not completed the exercise are those who have not received current salaries, those who have done theirs have since received their current salaries”, adding that workers who have complied with the verification exercise would start receiving payment alerts by Tuesday, July 21.