Ebonyi State Government says it will commence payment of the new minimum wage as agreed by the Federal Government and the Organised Labour from January, 2020.
Gov. David Umahi said this on Friday in Abakaliki, while signing into law, the state’s 2020 budget as passed by the House of Assembly.
The governor signed N178 billion comprising recurrent expenditure of N46 billion and capital expenditure of N132 billion.
Umahi, however, pleaded with the organised labour over the state government’s inability to pay arrears of the new wage.
He said that the state had financial constraints a situation which everyone in the state understood.
“We however have the N500m approved by the State House of Assembly to assist workers and other segments of the society, engage in alternative means of livelihood which is agriculture”.
Francis Nwifuru, Speaker of the House of Assembly, who witnessed the budget signing, said that he was satisfied with the way previous budgets had been implemented in the state.
“We are impressed with this beautiful and well-articulated budget which we are optimistic will make Ebonyi work,” he said.
