Oyo-Ita asks civil servants to go into farming

Winifred Oyo-Ita, head of civil service of the federation, has advised civil servants to take to farming in order to augment their income.

She said this in an interview with NAN on the sidelines of the ongoing 40th National Council on Establishment meeting in Owerri, Imo state.

She explained that although civil servants are not allowed to have another job outside their regular work, they can engage in farming to sustain their families.

“Civil Servants can identify an area in agriculture that they are interested in and start farming to augment their salary, considering the low salary level and all that,” she said.

She said she expected the presidential committee on minimum wage to come up with a positive recommendation that will enhance the salary of civil servants.

According to Oyo-Ita, the civil service is the engine room of all government policies and programmes and no matter the crisis in a country, the civil servants keep working, citing the civil war era where all institutions collapsed except the civil service.

“Our political leaders can come up with noble policies but it is the civil service that will bring those policies and programmes into realisation for the masses to assess the government of the day,” she said.

She added that the rule barring secretaries in the civil service from breaking the ceiling of level 14 in their career.

According to her, secretaries who were employed as confidential secretaries would not be automatically upgraded even if they acquire more qualifications, except they apply for a review.

“As a confidential secretary, you acquire more degrees and qualifications in the course of your job, you are expected to apply for a change of cadre,” she said.

“If you are desirous to improve your exit point from the service, you should apply for change of cadre to the administrative after improving yourself.

“But don’t expect that because you have a PhD and you are still a confidential secretary, you will automatically be upgraded.”

She, however, urged civil servants to be resilient in carrying out their duties for the growth of the nation.