The Kwara State Governor, Abdulraman Abdulrazaq, has been accused by some health workers in the state of owing them some allowances since 2022.
The health workers, who are mostly ad-hoc staff, were recruited in August 2022 during the COVID-19 vaccination exercise in the state. They were promised N22, 500 every two weeks for a period of three-months and they agreed to work with the health agency in the state to vaccinate state residents against the Coronavirus pandemic. About 1,000 ad-hoc staff were employed under the Kwara State Primary Health Care Development Agency for COVID-19 vaccination, however, almost a year after the exercise, most of the team members are yet to be paid their allowances.
It was gathered that those employed worked for at least six weeks between the 7th of August, 2022 and the 30th of October, 2022 before the agency ended their contract after the vaccination exercise was over. Some of the affected workers alleged that they were paid for only two weeks out of the six weeks they worked. All efforts to get the relevant stakeholders to pay them since then has been futile. Most of the affected workers lamented the hardship they have been subjected to as a result of the pay they didn’t receive. Some revealed that they had to borrow money to transport themselves to work while the exercise was going on. It was gathered that the state government has not been able to address the issue because of its efforts in bagging another tenure.
Some of the aggrieved workers also testified to the fact that the governor is always swift to respond to issues such as what the affected health workers are going through. Now that Governor Abdulrazaq has been re-elected, they have appealed to him once again to come to their aid.
