Palpable tension and anger are said to be growing at the headquarters of the Defence Industries of Nigeria (DICON) in Kaduna, Kaduna state over several unpaid emoluments and outright shortchanging of staff members, SaharaReporters has learnt.
The tension which might degenerate into a full-blown crisis is connected to 2016, and 2019 promotion arrears, 2019 promotion arrears, 2019 minimum wage arrears and most recently the 40% peculiar allowance increment, SaharaReporters has learnt.
DICON, established in 1964 to meet the armament needs of the country’s security forces and have a sprawling production line for various calibres of ammunition and weapons, usually has a senior military officer as its Director General.
The Act establishing DICON also prohibits its staff members from joining any trade union or partaking in its activities; however, this together with the nature of the leadership of the corporation has turned it into something similar to an appendage of the Nigerian Army, where orders are to be obeyed and not questioned.
Confiding in SaharaReporters, a senior military officer familiar with the brewing crisis in the establishment who spoke on condition of anonymity, noted that for several years now, the situation has been far from being ideal at DICON.
“Either the management of DICON is not telling the truth or the corporation is being short-changed by the ministry of finance. It has become a normal practice in the corporation that promotion arrears are not paid promptly.
“Sometimes, payments are not done until two years after the promotion. Unfortunately for the staff of the corporation, when such payments are made, they are denied the full complements of such payments and no reasonable explanation is given for such occurrences.
“The staff are not allowed to voice their opinion on any matter no matter how bad or oppressive it is. Once a staff member is perceived as being too opinionated and confrontational, that staff member is promptly dealt with by transferring him either to Bauchi where the company owns a non-functional facility or the explosive facility in Jebba in Niger State which is also non-functional.
“There have even been cases where petulant mental health was called to question because he stood his ground on a particular issue. He was unceremoniously bundled into the psychiatric hospital in Barnawa and placed on forced admission. Though he was eventually allowed to resume at his duty post, the action of the management against him was clear to other staff members and no one want to face such a humiliation.”
Also speaking in the same vein, a top management staff member of DICON who is happy with the current state of happenings, and spoke on condition of anonymity, disclosed that “2016 promotion for a particular cadre of staff came and exercise was smooth. Staff received their various promotion letters but the arrears tied to that exercise did not go to staff as and when due. When eventually the arrears were paid, staff found out that 40% of their emoluments were not paid. No explanation was given for this and the affected staff were immediately hushed.
“Another promotion exercise took place for the 2019 promotion and as expected, staff were promoted without the accompanying monetary benefits. When the arrears were paid this time around, staff got the shock of their lives when they realized only 58% of what is due them was paid.
Management in its usually oppressive stance warned those who dare to ask to be careful.
The then head of human resources, Mr. Ilia Kasa, told those who approached him for answers to count themselves lucky that they even received something from the payment.
“Around October 2019, the Minister for Labour and Productivity, Dr. Chris Ngige announced President Muhammadu Buhari’s approval of N30,000 minimum wage for federal government workers to commence immediately.
The minister went further to point out that the approval takes immediate effect from April 2019. However, payment of the new minimum wage did not commence for some parastatals until January 2020, which resulted in about eight months of arrears for most parastatals.
“By December 2019, some parastatals had already started receiving their arrears payment. Some others were to receive theirs in 2020. But four years down the line, the staff of DICON have neither received their share of the minimum wage increment nor do they even know when it will be paid, as the management has kept tight lips over the matter.
In 2019 when the new minimum wage was approved, Major General Victor Ezugwu was at the helm of affairs with DICON. All through his over two years stay, not a single word was said about the long-awaited arrears. All questions pertaining to the issue were immediately shut down.
“Last year over 150 staff members of the organization who were expecting their 2020 promotion arrears amounting to about N280,000 each, were paid a paltry N80,000 instead.
“When the aggrieved staff members complained about being short-changed, they were threatened and told they were even lucky to get something at all. It is rumoured that another set of staff members who expect to receive promotion arrears will get one-third of their entitled arrears and will not be able to complain.
“However, because other parastatals had received their own payment of the arrears, some staff members carried out a discreet investigation and found out that the funds meant for payment of the 2019 minimum wage arrears for DICON had since been released to the DICON management. In fact, this fact was corroborated by the Minister for Finance, Hajjia Zainab Ahmed, when she reiterated that the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government has paid up all outstanding promotion and minimum wage arrears.
“Now to the issue of 2023, 40% peculiar allowance increment/arrears. A couple of days ago, the Minister for Labour and Productivity, Dr. Chris Ngige assured civil servants of the federal government’s plan to commence payment for a negotiated 40% allowance increase for civil servants on CONPSS salary structure and a selected few. He doubled down on his earlier statement and reassured that payment of both the increment and the three months arrear will be paid this April.
“And true to his words, civil servants who received their April salaries were paid both arrears and the new increment. At DICON, the story is different. DICON workers are among the over 146,000 civil servants earmarked to benefit from this new increment, but due to the secretive nature of the management’s handling of information, staff members don’t even know their fate. The staff members have had it up to their neck and are willing to take their destiny into their own hands to make sure their entitlements are paid,” the staff member vowed.
The workers are however calling on anti-graft agencies to beam their searchlights on the activities of DICON management and unravel the “barefaced corruption taking place in the corporation”.
However, all efforts to reach the new Directory General of DICON, Major General H. D. Tafida, proved abortive.
But when contacted on the issues, the head of human resources, Ogba Aboh, declined to comment on them, saying, “I am not capable of speaking on that issue.”
On his part, the immediate past DG, Major General Victor Okwudili Ezugwu, dismissed all the allegations.
He said his tenure brought glory to the organisation, adding, “Go to DICON and ask for records and get your facts correct. My days in DICON were the glorious days of DICON. All the factories that were not working as at the time I came, all came alive. I was paying bonuses to staff. I was giving them lunch too. I never touched their money. What I left at DICON was very positive.”
