Despite the promise made by the Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and with only a few hours to Christmas, majority of civil servants have not received their December salaries, even though they pleaded for anonymity confirmed to Forumspotz that they had not received their salaries.
The delay in salary payment affects staff of about 14 ministries alleged to have misused the Integrated Payroll and Personal Information System (IPPIS) system.
We learnt that the wrong action on the IPPIS system, which is programmed to reject irregular procedures, had locked the MDAs in question out of the system.
A worker with the Federal Minister of Finance said they had not received payment alert as at yesterday night.
Sources at the finance ministry told us yesterday that the Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had directed that all workers should be paid salaries before the Christmas break.
A statement clarifying the status of the payment of the December 2014 salaries of federal civil servants, issued on Monday by the spokesperson of the Minister of Finance, Paul C Nwabuikwu, said already salaries were being processed since Friday.
“Also being processed are the salaries of the staff of 14 MDAs where there has been a misuse of the salary budgets to pay promotion arrears and other allowances,” the statement said.
“We have taken action to rectify the problem and the salary arrears of the staff of the affected MDAs will be paid along with those of their colleagues in other agencies.”
IPPIS system was set up to ensure the smooth running of payment processes.
The Federal Ministry of Finance urged all MDAs to desist from irregular actions which hamper the operation of the IPPIS system leading to payment delays and suffering for civil servants.
Forumspotz also learnt that most banks were working for half day today (Wednesday) due to the Christmas break.
