It clearly seems hard days are ahead for ITF boss as
More facts have emerged into the unprecedented
underhand dealings which crept into the Industrial
Training Fund, ITF, ever since Mrs. Juliet Chukka-
Onaeko became the Director-General of the agency last
year. Her alleged flagrant abuse of office is such that is
evident in the delayed payment of the August salary of
some workers at the institution, as gathered.
DAILY POST can authoritatively report that the
embattled DG had since last May when she assumed
office engaged in employment bazaar that saw her
employ “over 400 persons in flagrant disregard of the
Federal Character principle and without passing
through the Federal Character Commission.”
An inside source at the agency, who begged not to be
named for fear of victimization, alleged that, “some
beneficiaries of the illegal employment, mostly
graduates, were made to part with as much as
N400,000 to secure the jobs. The DG had external
persons who collected these monies on her behalf so
as not to get implicated.”
Between March and April 2015, the DG was said to
have “illegally recruited 260 persons and because there
were no vacancies before they were employed, it has
been difficult to put them on payroll. Since the
beneficiaries collected their employment letters, they
have not received salaries until last month when the
DG found a way to get them paid their August salaries.
“But as if robbing Peter to pay Paul, this move by her
resulted in the delay in the payment of last month
salaries of other staff of the institution. I can tell you
that since I started working here years ago, this is the
first time that ITF is owing salary of workers,” a staffer
confided in DAILY POST.
Meanwhile, checks by this newspaper revealed that the
Federal Character Principle requires that a parastatal,
such as ITF, must only employ workers when there are
vacancies.
It also demands that before any recruitment can be
carried out into any government agency or parastatal,
such must be advertised in at least two national
dailies, after which applicants would be shortlisted and
told to prepare for examination. But it was learnt that
none of these obtained in the close to 500 persons
illegally employed by the DG till date.
However, when the failure of the institution to pay staff
began to put the ITF boss under intense pressure, a
well-informed source told our correspondent that, “she
sent an SMS to the Director of Administration where
she requested to be furnished with the list of all
redundant staff in ITF for termination. Of course, you
know that the redundant staff cannot include those she
fraudulently collected money from to be given job at
ITF.”
While rhetorically asking DAILY POST what can Mrs
Chukka-Onaeko’s rationale be for coming in and
immediately began recruiting over 400 people without
first carrying out a personnel audit, the insider noted
that “the question many of us are now asking is why
employ without first of all carrying out an audit?.”
Nevertheless, the credibility of Mrs. Juliet Chukka-
Onaeko to occupy the position of ITF DG has also
come under question. The present DG, who took over
leadership of the fund from a renowned academic, Prof.
Longmas Wapmuk, was said by a highly-placed staff at
the agency to be “flaunting an honorary doctorate
degree as her prized qualification to seat as DG of an
ITF that has always been headed by Professors. We
have actually advised her to remove the ‘Dr’ she
attaches to her name lest she by that attracts the
attention of prying journalists because people actually
know it is honorary.”
Further investigations by this newspaper revealed that
Mrs Chukka-Onaeko actually got the honourary degree
from St. Clement University at Ireland, which is highly
known for granting online degrees to some Nigerians
including the sitting governor of a North-Central state.
Our correspondent spoke with a former Director at ITF
who said, “Her (Chukka-Onaeko) CV is very vague and
this is why people are questioning her qualification for
that job. Whoever is to be the ITF DG is expected to
have 35 years working experience; must have headed a
Grade A parastatal as a senior director if not chief
executive officer. She was just a board member at one
parastatal before the former president catapulted her to
head the ITF.”
DAILY POST had before now laid this findings before a
Media Aide to the ITF DG, Mr. Meshach Idehen and he
responded thus: “just like the figures you are asking
for, I will also need to liaise with the appropriate
quarters. This is a government agency that does
employment for qualified people. But what I will need
to clarify is that exact number of 400”.
As regards Mrs. Chukka-Onaeko’s qualifications for
the job, he said: “Certainly, I don’t have anything to say
about that because I am not the one that made her
appointment and I’m sure the appropriate authority
which made the appointment in the previous year knew
exactly the kind of professional they were looking for to
run the organisation the way they wanted”
Meanwhile, another allegation on the neck of the
embattled DG is the one that has to do with her
converting a bus-like vehicle which was then used by
her predecessor into personal use. Emerging facts
have it that the same vehicle is now been used by a
private school in Abuja (names withheld) belonging to
Mrs. Juliet Chukka-Onaekko. Efforts to get her reaction
on this proved abortive.
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