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• Want Prof. Monye’s Accrued Rights Review suspended
• Stop meddlesomeness of DESOPADEC mgt in Union matters
• Appoint new permanent secretaries to fill vacant spaces

The Delta State Council of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), Asaba chapter has on the occasion of the May Day 2017 celebration made a seven-point demand on the government of Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State.

The demand is contained in an address delivered by the Delta State Chairman of the Union, Comrade Chinedu Nwobodo at the occasion, when he acknowledged that although the administration of Governor Okowa has performed creditably well in service dlivery with regard to its SMART Agenda with Youth Agricultural Entrepreneurship and Skills Training Pogrammes as the flagship, but that despite this workers are confronted with myriads of problems that they request the state government to solve.

The demands according to Comrade Nwobodo are as follows:

• Appeal by Delta State workers to Governor Okowa to suspend the Professor Monye’s Accrued Rights review as that will further plunge the entire contributory Pension Scheme into irreparable confusion as no individual opinion could supersede that of the Pension Reforms Act even though such was domesticated by the State at the point of take- off.
• Removal of tax Consultants in the collection of Delta State revenues as the staff of the Board of Internal Revenue (BIR) are ready and able to do what the Consultants are doing. Their logic is that after over 22 years of using consultants that civil servant ought to have been made to acquire whatever expertise that the consultants possess.
• TUC’s clarion call to stop the unnecessary meddlesomeness of the management of the Delta State Oil Producing Area Development Commission (DESOPADEC) in Union matters. “We wish to use this opportunity to inform His Excellency that after 10 years of the establishment f the Commission, the workers are still casuals with no pension arrangement in place. The deductions from the salaries of workers are being kept by management without remitting same into the workers’ Retirement Savings Account (RSA).”
• Workers are still waiting for the Governor to fulfill his promise to deliver to workers an ultra modern state secretariat.
• That the Governor should fulfill his promise to fast track the implementation of the consent judgment obtained four years ago in the resolution of the dispute between the Academic Staff Union of Secondary School (ASUSS) and the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) sa as to bring this matter to an end.
• Government is called upon to intervene in the stoppage of operation of the Union of Tipper and Quarry Employees of Nigeria (UTQEN) in Udu and Ughelli North Local Government Areas of the State. “May we state unequivocally that the activities of UTQEN do not in any way constitute any breach of peace and security of the Local Government Councils under reference. “
• Urgent intervention of Governor Okowa in the area of the appointment of permanent secretaries and provision of official vehicles to retired and serving ones. “As at the last count, the State has only 36 permanent secretaries thereby creating many vacancies to be filled in state public service. We observe that for over two years now, this tradition has almost been eroded from the public service. As at today, about three sets of permanent secretaries have retired from the service without this thank you gesture from the State government. We want to remind His Excellency that the beauty of becoming a permanent secretary has always spurred the civil servants to strive for excellence in their career.”