The Minority Leader of the Senate, Senator Eyinnaya Abaribe, has said that the Senate will take an official position on the decision by the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, SAN, to flout its decision on the recruitment of 774,000 workers across all the Local Government Areas in the country.
He stated that the Senators are expecting the Senate President, Ahmed Lawan, to brief them on the outcome of Thursday’s meeting of the Presiding Officers of the National Assembly with President Muhammadu Buhari, on the issue.
His words: “The Senate will take an official position on the issue next Tuesday, after listening to the outcome of the meeting between the Presiding Officers and the President, over the matter.
“We asked our Presiding Officers to meet with President Buhari on the issue, and we have not had plenary since they returned. The Senate President will brief us on Tuesday, at plenary, and we will make a decision on it.”
The National Assembly had suspended the Special Public Works, SPW, Programme, penultimate week, following a disagreement between its Committee on Labour and Keyamo.
The Lawmakers accused Keyamo of hijacking the recruitment exercise from the National Directorate of Employment, NDE, which got N52 billion approval to carry out the Programme.
However, Keyamo told Journalists on Tuesday, that Buhari had asked him to proceed with the recruitment process, notwithstanding the position of the National Assembly on the issue.
The development forced the Senate to hold an emergency closed-door session on Wednesday, and mandated Presiding Officers of both Chambers of the National Assembly to immediately meet with the President, on the proposed recruitment of 774,000 Federal workers.