Despite the assurances given by Governor Alex Otti that no further mass sacking of Abia workers would be carried out, fear and anxiety still hangs in the air as Abia workers ponder the reason for fresh compilation of names allegedly ordered by the governor.
The fresh wave of fear and anxiety sweeping across the Abia government employees followed a directive issued to the ministeries, departments and agencies(MDAs) to compile names of Directors that have stayed upwards of two years.
Similar directive was also issued by the Local Government Service Commission(LGSC) to all the Heads of Service(HoS) in the Council areas.
The Heads of Personnel Management (HPM) were specifically asked “to compile and forward the names of substantive Directors that have stayed two years and above in the service”.
In the directive signed by Emelike Oji on behalf of the Permanent Secretary, LGSC, the HoS in the Local Governments were given a deadline of “on or before Wednesday October 2, 2024” to submit the compiled names to the office of the State HoS.
“I am directed to request that you should ensure strict compliance,” the memo said.
Some workers whose names were in the compiled list told our reporter that they were worried because there was every likelihood that directors who have neither attained the requisite years of service nor clocked the retirement age could be axed “for political reasons”.
“The governor is bent on sacking people who have not reached their retirement age or number of years in service,” he moaned.
To justify his fear, the concerned Director who didn’t want his name mentioned, pointed to “what happened last year when a number of Permanent Secretaries and Directors were sacked for political reasons”.
Another senior worker said that he could not understand why Otti appeared to have made civil servants his “punching bag” since he assumed office, adding “he has been sacking people without following due process”.
“I can say without any fear of contradictions that the governor is biased against civil servants. He has been using politics to throw many people out of the system whereas he has selfishly increased the years (of service) for teachers and those in medical line,” he said.
Recently, the Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Comrade Ogbonnaya Okoro stated that the organised labour were having an unresolved issue with Governor Otti over the senior civil servants who were sacked without payment of their entitlements.
He had warned that the shabby treatment of the sacked Permanent Secretaries and Directors was drawing the government to a collision path with Abia NLC.
The already charged atmosphere industrial relation in Abia would be reaching a boiling point if government eventually goes ahead witn further sacking of workers.