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Autonomy: Labour Calls for One-Year Recruitment Freeze for LGs
This initiative aims to determine the accurate number of local government workers, primary school teachers, and pensioners across all 774 local government areas in Nigeria.
As part of their recommendations under the Joint Action Committee (JAC) of local government-based unions, they also suggested implementing a one-year recruitment freeze for new staff in local governments, including teachers.
This pause would take effect from the date of the Supreme Court’s judgment on direct payments, ensuring stability during this transition.
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These proposals come in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling granting financial autonomy to local governments and aim to enhance the efficiency of local government operations during the direct remittance of federal allocations.
Leaders from the unions, including NUT President Titus Amba, NULGE President Ambali Akeem, and NUP President Godwin Abumisi, emphasized in their seven-point recommendations that “to ensure a smooth implementation of the direct payment system, JAC recommends staff redistribution, placement, and an auditing exercise to accurately ascertain the numbers of local government workers, primary school teachers, and pensioners.”
The JAC also called for the restructuring of supervisory institutions that manage local government workers. They proposed expanding the statutory members of these agencies to include local government chairmen, heads of local government-based unions, and other relevant stakeholders to ensure quality control and inclusivity.
For the Local Government Service Commission, the JAC suggested including representatives from the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON) and NULGE in its statutory membership.
Similarly, for the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), they proposed including representatives from ALGON and NUT, while the Local Government Staff Pension Board should include representatives from ALGON, NUP, NULGE, and NUT.
Additionally, the Primary Health Care Agency’s statutory membership should involve representatives from ALGON and local government health practitioners.
In light of significant deficits in infrastructure and service delivery across many local governments, the JAC urged the Federal Government to intervene by procuring essential machines and equipment, such as tractors, graders, bulldozers, refuse disposal vans, septic evacuation vans, and materials for vocational skill acquisition centers.
They recommended that funding for these procurements be deducted from local government allocations over time in an installment plan.
The JAC also proposed reorganizing the local government’s peace and security committee for better indexing, registration, kitting, intelligence gathering, policing, and regular bi-monthly meetings, which would be coordinated and funded by the local government.
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To ensure worker welfare and industrial harmony, they emphasized that payments for training, capacity building, and sustainability in the local government system should be prioritized. This includes:
- Domiciling the gross salary of local government workers with the Local Government Service Commission.
- Allocating 2% of the total local government allocation for running grants and training to the Local Government Service Commission.
- Domiciling the gross salary of primary school teachers with SUBEB.
- Dedicating 1.5% of total local government allocation for SUBEB running grants to SUBEB.
- Deducting 25% of the gross salary of teachers and local government workers for pension and gratuity, to be managed by the Local Government Staff Pension Board.
- Allocating a 5% grant for traditional councils, which should be deducted and deposited into their accounts.
JAC finally recommended strengthening the Federal Ministry of Special Duties and Inter-Governmental Affairs as a supervisory body.
This ministry would be responsible for policy formulation, coordination, implementation, and supervision, as well as coordinating reforms in local government through quarterly summits aimed at reviewing government economic policies related to the Local Government Scheme of Service every five years to boost productivity and policy assurance at the local level.
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