TUC To Governors: Account For Security Votes You’re Collecting

 

The Trade Union Congress (TUC) has called on the 36 state governors to account for the usage of security votes they have been collecting all these years amidst rising insecurity in various states.

According to the trade union congress, state governors should stop making security matters shrouded in secrecy.

The union also demanded that the Federal Government should start immediate process of cutting down the cost of governance either by scrapping the Senate or House of Representatives rather than paying lip service to the matter.

National Treasurer of TUC, who doubles as President-General of the Senior Staff Association of Statutory Corporations and Government-Owned Companies (SSASCGOC), Mohammad Yunusa, made the call during an interview with reporters in Abuja.

Yunusa, while reacting to a question on what labour unions are doing to help the government in fighting insecurity said: ‘’Let us look at the narratives before now. The government gives security votes to all state governors before now as chief security officers of their states, and before now, that money is not usually accounted for.

‘’If you ask how they are using it, they will tell you that security matters are shrouded in secrecy, that you don’t need to see what we are doing with it.

‘’If you’re the chief security officer of a state, and you’re being given security votes, I don’t know how much that is given to you, I don’t know what you’re doing with it, how can I help you to secure the state? I don’t know what your programmes are.

‘’We are now changing the narratives to say no, if the security is the collective responsibility of every citizen, let the state governors share their plans with the citizens, so that we can key into that plan and secure our state.’’

The labour leader stressed that the only way to reduce insecurity is by fighting poverty in the land, saying investments would keep eluding the country if insecurity challenges are not properly addressed.

He added: ‘’We have been saying it that government must cut down the cost of governance. Nobody can say, even the media, how much is spent by the Nigerian government on the bicameral legislature for example. You have the Senate, you have the House of Representatives, and if you look at their functions, they are duplicated.

“So, a government that is serious about cutting down cost, will now say, okay, let’s have only one legislature. Let’s have the unicameral legislature, then scrap House of Representatives for example. Then, whatever you’re pouring to that place, you can save it and divert it to do other things.”