Gov. Rauf Aregbesola of Osun on Tuesday said his administration was committed to the welfare of workers and pensioners in the State despite their unpaid salaries and pension entitlements.
Aregbesola made the remark while receiving Triangular Group, a factional group of retirees, who paid him a solidarity visit in Osogbo.
He said: “workers and pensioners welfare remains my priority despite the fact that some people are out to tarnish the image of my administration over the delay in the payment of salaries.’’
The governor said what caused the delay in the payment of salaries and pension was the fall in the federal allocation due to the state, and fall in price of oil in the international market.
Mr Rotimi Adelugba, Chairman of the group, said, it was necessary that they dissociated themselves from politically motivated protests.
Adelugba said they were opposed to any plot to destabilise the state under the guise of pressing for pensions and salaries.
He said they dissociated themselves from “politically motivated protests by a group of people last week’’, adding that such protest was not in the interest of pensioners.
He held that all those who were protesting on behalf of the pensioners were a group of people allegedly sponsored.
According to him, the Triangular group, which comprises pensioners in all the local government areas of the state, identifies with the developmental strides of the present administration in the state.
He stated that the non-payment of salaries, though affects thousands of workers in the state, was not peculiar to Osun alone.