Federal civil servants attached to the headquarters of Police Service Commission (PSC), on Thursday paralysed activities at their workplace while demanding the resignation of the chairman of the commission, Musiliu Smith.
The aggrieved workers, who were protesting alleged takeover of the recruitment of 10,000 constables by the force headquarters, lack of staff promotion and training by the commission management, among other things forced the Permanent Secretary, William Alo, and other directors out of their respective offices.
The protesting civil servants alleged that Smith connived with the Inspector-General of Police, Usman Baba, to shortchange the commission by handing over the constables’ recruitment exercise to the IGP which is PSC’s responsibility.
Speaking during the demonstration, Chairman, Joint Union Congress, PSC chapter, Adoyi Adoyi, declared a three-day warning strike, insisting that fresh actions will be taken against the management of the commission if their demands have not been met by Monday.
He said, “We planned the warning strike for today (Thursday) and the permanent secretary had a meeting with us but we could not make a headway concerning the demands we made to them (management) He was just telling us to shift grounds without proffering solutions to the issues.
“The permanent secretary read the management decision to us but there was no timeline to the promises. We suspected it was a ploy to get us off their backs.”
The labour leader narrated that the commission’s management was pressuring the workers to go for their Basic Travel Allowance approved for the field monitoring of the recruitment, noting that the workers were rather interested in working for whatever they were paid.
He noted, “After the chairman traveled, the police were going ahead with the recruitment which we suspected was of his making because it was just after we had our agitation that the police timetable was released and there was no preparation in the commission; they were telling us that we should collect our BTA.
“The police were always involved in the exercise but it is always driven by the commission because it is our mandate but why they want to exclude the commission is a secret between the police and the chairman.
“The management promised to conclude the promotion examination but it has not been done. Last year, the exercise dragged on for so long and was not concluded due to vested political interests.”
When contacted, the spokesman of the commission, Ikechukwu Ani, said that he was out of Abuja, and as such he was unaware of the development.
“Sorry, I am not in town, in the East for the Sensitization programme of the Commission,” he told our correspondent via a text message.
