Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State has approved the conversion of ad-hoc staff of the 33 local government councils in the state to permanent staff.

Makinde made this declaration while speaking at the official commissioning of the newly-built Local Government House and Staff Training School.

The event was held on Wednesday in Ibadan, the state capital.

Makinde said that the decision to convert the ad-hoc staff to permanent staff was taken to bridge the gap in the workforce at the local government level.

He added that due process for the employment must be followed effectively and perfected within four weeks.

He assured that his administration would continue to seek innovative ways to support and collaborate with local government authorities for the benefits of the citizens in order to actualise his vision for the state.

He added that the newly-built complex will provide a conducive environment for the local government staff and also enhance their productivity.

He maintained that the facilities within the State Secretariat would be renovated and transformed before the expiration of his administration in 2027.

Makinde said, “We will continue to work with the local government so that our vision at the state level can also be sold to the local government administrators. When there is synergy, we can achieve more.

“For primary school teachers, their leave bonuses were last paid in 2017. The primary schools, PHCs and other things were in a bad shape. But we have paid the primary school teachers their leave bonus for 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023.

“So, we had to figure out a way of reducing this deficit and we won’t play games with anybody because they are our own people. We insisted that first line items must be drawn against the LG account.

“It was a home-grown way of ensuring that outstanding pension and gratuities are paid. We have paid backlogs of over N18 billion in pension and we have also paid over N15 billion gratuities to retirees.”