Juliana Taiwo
5 November 2009
Abuja — Some volunteers attached to the Abuja National Stadium for the ongoing FIFA U-17 World Cup yesterday sentationally downed tools and refused to work by accusing the Local Organising Committee of being insensitive to their plight. A source from the LOC confirmed this development except that he pleaded not to be quoted.
The source said the volunteers were told they would be given N7,000 as transport allowances yesterday but nothing forthcoming came out of the promise. Instead the LOC has been issuing threats to the volunteers.
An inside source said the LOC has remained adamant in all efforts to make them see the need to increase the volunteers package.
"It's a shame that the LOC after all the promises to make us happy is treating us like slaves. Even if we are beggars and in search handouts, it would be very unreasonable to accept the meagre sum we are offered as allowance", one volunteer said last night.
In the same vain some of the LOC staff have revealed their fears that once the FIFA U-17 Championship ends on November 15, their unpaid salaries which have accumulated since July will go with the wind.
It is based on this that they are planning to stage a protest to press home their demands sometime next week.
A staff of the LOC told THISDAYSports that the drivers in particular have concluded plans to withdraw their services; especially after the FIFA officials must have converged on Abuja for the final of the cadet championship in order to hand twist the LOC into paying them.
"The LOC management has been promising us since last month, and we are now in November without any hope of getting our outstanding salary.
"We are getting worried as the championship will soon be over. What will be our fate? If we don't cry out now that will be the end and we are not willing to take chances. Usually, they try to mollify us with the promise that the salaries would soon be paid. But it is now dawning on us that it is a bogus assurance just to run out the time. This is very confusing", the source said.
Some of the contractors are also expressing similar fear that they might not get their pay for the jobs executed for the organising committee.
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