The Akwa Ibom State chapter of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has revealed that a recent physical verification exercise of civil servants uncovered over 2,000 ghost workers. Comrade Alpha Marshall, the State NLC Secretary, disclosed this during an interview on XL106.9FM’s “Super Breakfast Show, The Talk,” in Uyo on Tuesday. He praised Governor Umo Eno for initiating the exercise, which he described as a solid foundation for strengthening the state’s civil service. Marshall noted that out of the 55,120 workers recorded before the exercise, a little over 51,700 have been successfully verified.
Marshall highlighted that the verification process was seamless and transparent, with the report now ready for submission to the governor. He added that efforts are being made to organize a rescheduled verification exercise for civil servants with issues related to mismatched details on their National Identification Numbers (NIN). However, this additional exercise will not delay the submission of the current report to the governor.
The verification exercise aligns with Governor Umo Eno’s commitment to improving civil servants’ welfare. As part of this effort, the governor had pledged to implement an N80,000 minimum wage for public workers starting in November of the previous year, contingent upon the completion of the physical verification process.