The staff of Abuja Environmental Protection Board (AEPB) on Tuesday embarked on an indefinite strike over non-implementation of a new salary structure.
The workers vowed not to return to work until their needs are implemented.
Speaking on behalf of the agency, an Assistant Director, Barr Udeme Umanah, who spoke to newsmen in Abuja, gave reasons why the workers decided to embark on strike.
He said AEPB is an autonomous agency established under the AEPB Act of 1997.
The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) wants AEPB to be a department under the administration but the act provided that the board employs its staff and others can be by secondment. The Director of AEPB is elected by the FCT Minister.
“Because of the work functions that are very sensitive and hazardous, the National Salary and Income Wages Commission recommended the CONHESS salary structures to AEPB.
“The presidential committee approved the same salary structures approved by the National Salary and Income Wages Commission which was forwarded to the FCTA in 2021.
‘’They commenced the CONHESS salary structures from January 2020. The Health, Agric, Social Development Secretariat, and FCT-IRS earn different salary structures.
“We gave the administration 21 days’ notice to implement the salary structures for AEPB; we gave them seven days and finally, we gave them three days’ notice.
“It was after the expiration of the three days’ notice that the minister called us, and agreed to implement the salary structures and pleaded that we should not go on strike and that we should give them two weeks to sort it out.
“By last Friday, our two weeks’ notice expired and by Monday, we embarked in an indefinite strike and we are not ready to go back until they implement our salary structures,” he said.
City & Crime reports that AEPB workers, on Tuesday, barricaded the agency’s headquarters in protest over the non-implementation of a new salary structure.
Some of the staff said the new salary structure had been approved in 2019 but was yet to be implemented by the authorities.
They added that the protest was to register their displeasure over the situation and to draw the attention of the FCT Minister.
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