National Youth Service Corps members, yesterday, described their omission from the wage award as disheartening and heartbreaking.
Recall that payment of wage awards to Nigerian workers was one of the deals agreed upon by organised labour and the Federal Government as one of the ways to mitigate the effect of subsidy.
Speaking with Vanguard in Ado-Ekiti, some Batch B, Stream II corps members in the state lamented the unbearable economic situation, stressing that they thought the wage award would be one of their new year packages apart from their monthly allowance of N33,000.
The corps members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, noted that the surge in the prices of food and commodities has affected her finances, alongside the skyrocketed cost of transportation posed by the economic realities.
One of the NYSC members said: “One would think that with the way the standard of living is expensive, they would not be considerate enough.
“Prices of food items and commodities are on the high side, everything is having variant yet increasing prices on a daily and the same thing goes for transportation.”
Another corps member in Batch B, stream I said: “I work in a government establishment so, when I heard that the Federal Government is implementing wage awards, I felt corps members would be beneficiaries but to my greatest surprise, allowance didn’t increase after the month ended.
“N33,000 is not enough, please. We spend the bulk of the money on transportation and feeding, most of us have to walk from the house to our place of primary assignments and the PPA doesn’t pay.”
Another Batch C, stream I corps member, said: “Some of us fend for ourselves as our parents have abandoned us financially saying we are ‘Federal Government pikin’ because we receive allowance.
“Imagine paying house rent, buying foodstuffs, feeding, buying data, transportation all inside N33,000.
The Federal Government should please come to our aid because it’s not easy for us at all. The money is not enough, we appreciate it but with the hike in feeding and transportation. It is no longer enough and there’s no time to do other jobs to fetch more money.”
