The Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, has declared free transport services for staff and management of the ministry.
Amaechi told his ministry’s staff at an interactive session on Monday that the decision was to help ameliorate the challenges faced by the staff in the discharge of their civic duties.
He said, “Knowing the background I come from, I felt that you people are spending more money having to transport yourselves to work and I’m surprised that they are collecting money from you for those buses.”
He directed the Permanent Secretary in the ministry to ensure the bus services are free of charge henceforth, saying “we’ll increase the number of staff buses, fuel and maintain them ourselves.”
Amaechi further assured that to improve on service delivery, training and retraining of staff personnel would be given top priority.
“We would devise a means of training and retraining our staff, be it locally or internationally; and it will be according to our resources,” he said.
Amaechi also directed the ministry’s Permanent Secretary to liaise with the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to post doctors to the ministry in view of plans to establish a medical centre for staff of the ministry.
“Let us get the NYSC to post to the ministry at least two doctors, so we can ascertain the cost of establishing a clinic for our staff. This will enable those who fall ill to get free treatment,” he said.
The minister also noted that henceforth, provision of laptops for engineers will be included in the ministry’s budget.
In her remarks, the Minister for State for Transportation, Gbemisola Saraki, assured workers of smooth working relationship, stating that she would work together with Amaechi to improve on staff welfare.
“Whatever the Minister (Amaechi) had been doing, I will follow suit. I will always be behind him and I will do my best to always ensure that we do what will promote staff welfare,” she said.
Earlier in his remarks, the Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Transportation, Sabiu Zakari, said the essence of the interactive session was to create better understanding with the ministers.
He enjoined the staff to provide support to the ministers to achieve the vision of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
“It is our hope that as we gave our support to the Hon. Minister of Transportation during the first tenure, we’ll give even more this second term,” he said.
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