Angry civil servants under the Joint Union Action Committee (JUAC) shut down the office of the FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike on Monday, June 30, kicking off a three-day protest over unpaid wages, the prolonged primary school teachers’ strike, and suspended allowances.
They also demanded the removal of Emeka Ezeh, Chairman of the FCT Civil Service Commission.
The protest, which started with workers sealing off the minister’s office gate, blocked access to and from the building.
It followed a mobilisation directive issued last Thursday by JUAC President, Rifkatu Lortyer, calling on affiliate unions to join the demonstration from June 30 to July 2.
Addressing the crowd, Lortyer listed multiple grievances. She accused the FCT administration of failing to release overhead costs essential for basic office operations.
“We cannot work when overhead is not released,” she said. “We held a meeting with one of them and they say is overhead not for the directors? Is that true? Is it not for working?
“How can somebody as high-ranking as that say that overhead is for directors? It means they don’t even know. But I want them to know that from that overhead is what we use to work.
“It is a recurrent for office maintenance and other things that should be used for work. But we do not have it,” she said.
She also criticised the administration for denying retired workers their deserved promotions before exit, which she said had cut off their career progress.
“My anger is more for our members that have retired when they are supposed to be in a particular cadre since 2024. They don’t even have a chance.
“If you were to be an assistant director and you retired in 2024, it means they have gone with your career progression. And so they stunted you, that is the end, even when you qualified.”
Lortyer added that many staff could no longer tell what their actual monthly salaries were due to inconsistent payments.
“Do you understand your salary every month? Today, you see this amount. Next tomorrow, you see this amount. Me, I don’t know what my salary is. And so we do not understand,” she said.
The protest also highlighted unpaid hazard allowances for health workers and abrupt salary stoppages for auxiliary staff by the Civil Service Commission.
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“Health workers’ hazard arrears not paid. Our auxiliary staff, enforcement squad, those people at the mortuary, those people at the cemetery, their monies are not being paid.
“The letter for the stoppage of this salary was written on the 10th of March by the commission chairman. Is he supposed to give us those kinds of directives?
“And as you engage even auxiliary staff, there is a procedure. You let people know you want their salary to stop at so-so amount.
“You don’t just abruptly stop people’s salary. In this hard economy, is that fair? That is the initiative of the Chairman. And we don’t think it is right.”
Supporting the protest, Audu Akogwu, Chairman of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) FCT Chapter, accused non-participating workers of betrayal and called the lack of overhead release shameful.
“We are dying; FCTA workers are dying, no overhead. The Permanent Secretaries have been regulated to nothing, the Directors are dead.
“Staff buy paper before they work. They buy pen before they work. No promotion for 2023, 2024, and today we are in 2025. No training for any staff, how do you want productivity?” he said.
Akogwu also condemned the Minister’s failure to compel local council chairmen to pay primary school teachers, who have been on strike for over 100 days.
“Primary schools are on strike, with local government workers, over a hundred days. Our children are on the streets, and you say you have given the local government bailout funds.
“The bailout funds you gave them, are they not accountable to you? As a governor, he was the one controlling the Local Governments in Rivers State.
“Why can’t he control the area councils here and put them on their toes to make sure they do justice to the bailout funds he gave them? That fund, I don’t trust it, because if he gave them, the area councils are not more powerful than the Minister himself.”
Akogwu warned that if the FCT Minister fails to take immediate action, a full shutdown of FCT operations will follow the protest.
“This is just a warning. First day, second and third day, that’s our protest. From then, we are shutting down the whole office. I promise, I’m going to mobilise all the TUC affiliates in Abuja. We are going to shut down every FCT office,” he said.