The former Governor of Osun State, Olagunsoye Oyinlola on Monday revealed that he wanted to slash workers salaries or retrench civil servants before he left government.

He said the step was meant to cushion the effects of the global economic meltdown which started since 2008.

Oyinlola was reacting to claims that the Osun State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola is maltreating workers in the state which did not happen during his era.

He explained that when the state finances had continued to drop, he was ready to downsize or slash salaries before the intervention of the top echelon of the state civil service.

“When we were there, we had two billion Naira coming from Abuja, we had 500 million Naira as our Internally Generated Revenue, we had 2.5 billion Naira in total. 1.6 billion Naira was for the salary, plus the pensions and the rest, we were using over 70 per cent of our revenue to foot the wage bill.

“So, I decided to call a state stakeholders meeting to see if we could slash salaries or retrench workers, and decided that the recommendations from that meeting should be taken to the state House of Assembly for ratification.

“When the head of the civil service knew about our idea, he pleaded that we should not downsize or slash salaries but give them the opportunity to work towards increasing the state IGR which I agreed to before we left office.”

Oyinlola said he did not plunge the state into any debt as mechanisms were in place to offset the 18 billion credit facility obtained to finance the 2009 budget as backed by the state House of Assembly.

“I did not have it in mind to put Osun in any debt before I left. It was in that time that the state Assembly led by Adejare Bello with 15 PDP and 11 APC members argued that we should borrow to finance the capital projects in the budget.

Before the court sacked me, I had spent 10 billion Naira out of the 18 billion Naira, paid 2.4 billion out of the loan, and 7.6 billion Naira was left. I would have returned the money before my tenure expired in May 2011 but for the judgement.”

“I borrowed to build UNIOSUN and I paid the debt in 11 months,” the former governor added.


http://www.channelstv.com/2017/05/29/i-wanted-to-slash-workers-salaries-when-i-was-in-govt-oyinlola/