Oyo Workers Will Receive 13th-month Salary as long as I Remain Governor — Makinde

Oyo State governor, ‘Seyi Makinde has pledged to pay the 13th-month salary throughout his tenure in office as he noted that Civil servants in Oyo state are changing the widely-believed tale that government workers are lazy people.

The governor, who was speaking at the state’s 2020 Productivity and Merit Award ceremony held at the International Conference Centre, University of Ibadan, stated that his administration will continue to recognize the contributions of Civil/Public servants to the development of Oyo State.

His words: “Yes, we all know the reputation that the civil servants have in the country. Some people even say that all lazy people come to the civil/public service because they don’t have to do any work. But here in Oyo State, we are surely changing that narrative

“When we came in, this administration paid the salary of workers in May 2019. It would have been paid in the first week of June 2019 and we said we would pick a date to always pay the workers’ salary and they said no, because they thought we could not sustain it. Well, this is over two years and I can tell you that the system we have set up does not need me to trigger the payment of salary on the 25th of every month.

“Well, we are in August and, in another two or three weeks, we will enter the ‘ember’ months. I can tell you that, in December, you will still get your 13th-month salary. By the grace of God, this is how it will continue until we complete our tenure in office.

“We changed the buses for the workers and opened the staff clinic in the secretariat. We have taken these actions to show how much we care about your well-being,” he said.

He also disclosed that the recent staff verification exercise was not meant to witch-hunt workers but rather meant to clear the reputation of the workforce and make their service more efficient.