Don't take huge bank loans - Ekiti Gov. warns teachers

Ekiti State Governor Ayo Fayose has warned
teachers against enslaving themselves with huge
bank loans which would leave them with little or
no salary at the end of each month.
He expressed regrets that taking so many bank
loans at the same time has impoverished many
teachers, dampened their morale and affected
their service delivery.
Fayose promised to carry out reforms that would
solve the perpetual problem of over-deduction of
salary of workers through the biometric payment
system introduced to block loopholes being used
to siphon the state’s lean resources.
The governor who spoke on Friday during an
interactive session with primary and secondary
school teachers at Ola Oluwa Muslim Grammar
School, Ado Ekiti on Friday also donated 400
laptops to Accounting Officers operating in the
state and Local Government levels.
The donation of the laptops was to facilitate the
collation of vouchers of teachers before onward
transmission to the Accountant General’s office
for payment.
Fayose warned that the teachers should not be
oblivious of the fact that a popular loan called
‘sharp-sharp’ introduced by one of the
commercial banks is fast becoming a burden
rather than benefit.
He said: “Workers need to be careful with these
loans from commercial banks, especially the one
called sharp-sharp. Many are facing serious
challenges caused by over-deduction by banks
and when they have problems they will be
blaming the government.
“I am not really happy with the idea of workers
going home empty handed after the payment of
salary because some had taken too many loans
and they are left with nothing after receiving
their salaries.
“That was why I had instructed the Local
Government accounting officers to crosscheck
vouchers prepared with the ones collated by
bursar of each school, so that all errors can be
detected before reaching the Accountant
General.
“And to those who had fallen victims of over-
deduction, we will address it through the ongoing
reforms. Though, we have no mandate to
interfere with what you do with your banks, but
being a passionate person and friend of the
teachers, I have directed the Accountant General
to bring the managers of those banks to me, so
that all these complaints can be addressed.”
According to him, he was aware that problems
arising from over deduction of salaries were
rampant at the local level, promising to
strengthen the system via decentralization of pay
points to really abate the noticeable bottlenecks.
He said though not all the accounting officers
will get the laptop computers in the first trench
of the distribution, promising to make up in the
next round while training will also follow
appropriately.


Source :naijaloaded
Edited by DANIEL IKECHUKWU EKWUNIFE for odogwublog.com