Workers under the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP) who have not received their monthly allowances for almost a year have called on government to take a critical look at the treatment being meted out to them.
According to the group, the management of the NYEP, without any tangible reasons, has denied them their allowances with the excuse that they are having problems with their account numbers.
The workers have however denied claims by management of NYEP, saying they have on several occasions presented their account numbers to management.
Information available CITY & BUSINESS GUIDE indicates that a number of workers posted to the Accountant Generals Department under the NYEP have not been given their allowances since last year.
According to the agitated workers, even though management of the NYEP had announced that NYEP workers with effect from this year would receive their outstanding allowances, some of them are being denied such allowances without any tangible reason.
One of the irate workers that recently stormed the offices of DAILY GUIDE revealed after several complaints to the head office of the NYEP, his five months outstanding allowances were released to him through the same bank with the same account number.
“This is why most of us believe that the management of the NYEP is just hiding behind the excuse of having problems with our account numbers to deny us allowances.”
However when CITY & BUSINESS GUIDE contacted the Deputy National Coordinator of NYEP, Finance, Alhaji Soleman Ibrahim, he described the allegation as unfounded.
He admitted that NYEP has been facing some challenges for some time now hence the delay in the disbursement of the allowances.
“But now we have released enough funds to cater for all workers under the programme so there is no basis for the allegation. What I know for fact is that some people under the programme who were not working were taking allowances,” he said.
According to Alhaji Ibrahim, the management of NYEP is doing everything possible to prevent such people from enjoying free allowances.