Sallah: Civil servants yet to resume work after holidays

Most civil servants working in Abuja, the nation’s capital, are yet to resume work fully after the two days of public holidays to observe the Sallah celebration.

The Federal Government had declared Wednesday and Thursday as public holidays to mark the 2021 Eidul-Fitr celebration.

A correspondent of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), who visited the Federal Secretariat in Abuja on Friday, however, observed that the complex which was usually a beehive of activities was virtually empty.

NAN reports that activities were low as most offices were locked with a few members of the staff and cleaners seen hanging around.

It was also observed that most of the major roads linking the secretariat, which were usually busy during weekdays as well as the car park, were scanty.

Some of the civil servants, who spoke with NAN, blamed the low turnout of workers after the holidays on the delay in the payment of salaries by the Federal Government.

They also said that the offices were devoid of the usual busy activities because some workers, who traveled for the break, were yet to return from their trips to Abuja.

Mrs Edith Odoemelam,  a civil servant, explained that non-payment of salary before the Sallah holidays could be one of the major reasons for the low turnout of workers to work.

“With the present economic challenges, it could be that those who traveled out of Abuja had financial challenges to return on time after spending little they had with their families

“It is a big challenge that some of us have experienced before, ” Odoemelam said.

Mr Ibrahim Suleiman, another civil servant, attributed the low turnout to what he tagged as “Nigerian attitude to work after holidays”.

“It has been our general attitude to extend holidays for ourselves whenever we have a break into weekends and the present situation is not an exception.

” Already there were rumors all over that the two days holidays was extended, which of course is not so and this has made some people feel relaxed, ” Suleiman observed.

Meanwhile, Mrs Carolyn Ekpaha, in her comment,  appealed to the government to look into issues of housing and transport systems which she described as serious challenges that bring hardship on those living in the suburb areas of Abuja.

“The issue of transportation for those of us living in the suburbs is another major challenge since private vehicles like mini buses (Araba) were moved out of the system.

” I am appealing to the government to look into this by restoring the BRT buses on the road to make movement easier for us,” Ekpaha appealed.