By Rotimi Ojomoyela
Ado-Ekiti
Workers in Ekiti state have been advised to vote according to their conscience in the March 28 presidential election and April 11 states and National Assembly elections.
Governor Ayodele Fayose gave the advice during a parley with the workforce of the state, adding that being a proponent of apolitical and non-partisan civil service, he would not coerce any worker to vote for any Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidates in the forthcoming elections.
He said civil servants, by their training and orientation should have no business in party politics, saying workers’ partisanship in politics had the tendency of destroying the entire service.
According to him, there is no crime in a particular civil servant having sympathy for one political party or the other or voting in an election, but that such a scenario will turn out to be something else when it is done to the extreme.
Fayose said his administration would continue to place high premium on the welfare of workers, in spite of the poor financial situation of the state.
Revealing that the immediate past government led by Dr Kayode Fayemi left a whopping sum of N7.7 billion as arrears of salaries and allowances, Fayose assured that his administration would meet all demands of the workers as soon as the finances of the state improved.
The governor said he would ever be grateful to the state civil servants for joining the forces that returned him to power after eight years he was impeached by the then House of Assembly.
Fayose, who pleaded for patience, appealed to workers to show understanding in view of the critical financial situation of the state.
He said: “I won’t be a governor that would take advantage of you. I won’t promise what I won’t be able to meet. Ekti is financially challenged now in view of the huge debt left behind by immediate past government and drop in oil price.
“This is not an attempt to malign anybody, but we have to state the facts as they are. We have tried to borrow money from banks, but they refused because we have not paid the one that was borrowed by the last administration. So, we can’t pay all allowances now.”
