Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Health workers in the FCT have threatened to proceed on industrial action from 1st June, over unpaid salaries, allowances, and other entitlements by Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA). 
The health workers, comprising of medical specialists/consultants, doctors in the 14 district hospitals and those in department of public health and primary healthcare development board, said the only thing that would stop the action is if the FCTA attend to their needs as quickly as possible.
The health workers, in a statement jointly signed by their representatives, said they have overstretched their patience limit with the FCT Administration, and are left with the only option strike to drive home their message.
The workers said they had repeatedly met with FCTA officials, and promises were made to resolve the issues, particularly as it concerns payment of outstanding salaries and other entitlements of the health workers, but no progress has been made so far in that regard.
The workers completely disagreed with the position of FCTA, which points to the fact the challenges in the management of Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) was responsible to challenges.
They said: “IPPIS payment platform commenced services since 2007 and we expect that all these teething problems should have been corrected by now. But it’s obvious that the platform is even worse with FCTA in comparison with other MDAs.
“Since the migration of FCTA into IPPIS platform, it has been a nightmare for our members. It has been non-payment of salaries, short payment of salaries, discrepancies in tax deductions, outrageous increase in tax deduction, late payment of salaries and non-remittance of third-party deductions as well as association/union dues and capitations, cooperative deductions and the likes.
“We made these issues known to management prior to the migration IPPIS, and four months since the migration, it has not been resolved, hence, the decision to withdraw our services by June 1st, if the needful is not done.”
The union representatives, thus, appealed to their members to remain calm and supportive, assuring them that all the needful would be done as soon as possible.