Unemployment: Dickson’s Cronies Shared 1000 Job Opportunities In Bayelsa, Group Alleged

Angry unemployed graduates in Bayelsa state have alleged that cronies of Gov. Henry Seriake Dickson, who are top government functionaries had shared the 1000 job opportunities meant for unemployed graduates in the state among themselves.

The angry graduates, under the leadership of Bayelsa State Graduates Forum (BSGF) on Wednesday expressed dissatisfaction over the ongoing 1,000 civil service job recruitment exercise embarked upon by the Governor Seriake Dickson.

The group, in a statement made available to newsmen in Bayelsa, through the secretary of the forum, Mr. Domor Mienye, described the exercise as a sham.

Mr. Mienye said the evident faulty handling of the recruitment process has made the leadership of the graduates forum to lose confidence in the entire process due to the irregularities associated with the recruitment.

In his words: “The process which started in June 2018 should have been completed by now but the fate of applicants is hanging in the balance.”

Mienye said though members of the group were expectant at the conception that the processes would be followed according to the directive of the state governor, he said “we are disappointed by the way and manner the exams were conducted.

“In this age and time where recruitment processes are completely automated, the Bayelsa state civil service commission is subjecting our people to a rigorous yet ineffective semi automated process, where scores for a computer based tests were not published because of their ulterior motive.”

He also noted that the irregular manner people from different local government areas were shortlisted for the second round of tests as some LGAs seem to be favoured over the others.

Domor said: “Information reaching the forum has it that the 1,000 slots have already been shared amongst top politicians and some cronies of the governor from a particular local government have hijacked a major percentage of the slots which is making it difficult for qualified graduates that participated in the exercise to be employed.

“We are using this medium to notify the public what the Dr. Peter Singabele led commission is doing which poses grave danger if not averted immediately, and we are appealing to the Restoration Governor to call the commission to order as his reputation and integrity will be harmed by this unholy act if not stopped.

“In a nutshell what we are saying is we expect a recruitment process that is free and transparent, no local government area is superior to the others. Hence, we expect the slots to be spread across the various LGAs using the metrics”.

The secretary concluded that for the interest of Bayelsans the commission should do the needful and publish the names within two weeks after which the forum will have no choice but to mobilise its members to make a peaceful protest to demand a transparent process.