The Niger State Governor, Mohammed Bago, has banned workers in the state civil service from wearing native wears like Kaftan, Babanriga and flowing gowns during work hours.
The ban takes immediate effect and applies to both male and female workers.
However, civil servants are allowed to wear traditional attire on Fridays, which is also the Jummat prayer day.
Bago announced the ban on Saturday during the presentation of land development and preparation equipment at the Brains and Hammers Rice City, Mohammed Inuwa Wushishi Farm, Chakwa Community in Wushishi Local Government Area of the state.
Handing down the directive, the governor said civil servants must dress like workers who work to create wealth and not noblemen.
The governor, who spoke in the Hausa language was captured in a video that went viral.
“From Monday to Thursday, there will be no Kaftan, no Babanriga. We came to work; whoever wants to wear Babanriga should leave work; that’s what we will do,” he said.
He explained that his government was committed to changing the narrative and orientation that civil service was all about sitting in offices with flowing gowns and nice clothes, expending public money and doing nothing to create wealth.
He said the youth, civil servants, politicians and traditional officeholders must all go back to the farm.
According to him, there’s wealth in farming, reinstating his earlier position that the state had no reason to be poor with its vast arable land.
He said the state government was on the right track to establish the Niger State Strategic food reserve and protect land from encroachment.
Bago used the forum to encourage youths to engage in agriculture, saying the government would commence the disbursement of N250,000 each to youths and women to facilitate their farming activities.
