Youth Corpers Owed 9-month Unpaid Allowances Begs Government Not to Allow Them Die of Hunger

National Youth Corps members are groaning in serious pain and hunger as they have begged the Oyo State government not to allow them die after being owed allowances for 9 months. 

Some National Youth Service Corps members serving in Oyo State have appealed to the state government to pay nine months’ arrears of state allowances owed them.

The members made the plea on Tuesday in Ibadan.

The state government had promised to be paying the sum of N4, 000 monthly to corps members serving in the state.

A 2015/16 Batch B Corps Member, Miss Miracle Onyekponwanne, said that she had not received any payment since the inception of her service in October 2015.

She said, “People like us teaching in schools do not even have accommodation and it is supposed to be the responsibility of the school and government. So, we have to accommodate ourselves and it has not been easy.

“With the situation of things in the country now, the N19, 800 the Federal Government is giving us is not even enough. We have to transport ourselves and do other things.

“We will pass out in October, yet we have not received anything. The government should please pay us everything at once or even twice, before we pass out.”

Also, Miss Oyinkansola Omotesho, of Batch B, said “I have not received anything at all since I started serving’’.

“It is better they tell us that they will not pay the allowance so that we remove our mind from it. We would have calculated what to use the money for but our hope are being dashed out.

“They should please be checking how they pay on the payroll because only few people received once but those of us teaching in my school has not received anything at all since 2015.”

Similarly, another Batch B member, Mr Meshach Omaji, said he only received two months allowance since October 2015, adding that other batches had not received any at all.

“Since I started serving in November 2015, I have only received twice. The first one was meant for December, 2015 but the second one was not stated, so I assumed it was for January 2016.

“I have not received any other one since then. Maybe I received those ones because I am serving with the state NYSC editorial department.

“Most of my colleagues have not received any since 2015.”

Another Corps member in a secondary school in Saki, who preferred anonymity, said that the state government had only paid the December and January allowances.

Omaji, however, pleaded with the government to pay the remaining allowance.

“The money should be for accommodation but when we did not receive it, we had to source for it from parents and relations.

“These are people we should even be giving money; no matter how little, rather than them giving us,’’ he said.

Efforts made to reach the Special Adviser to the Governor on Communication and Strategy, Mr Yomi Olayinka, failed.

NAN