The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in Osun State has urged the National Emergency Management Authority, NEMA, to donate food items to workers in the state who have not been paid for seven months.

The appeal was made by the Director of Media and Strategy of the PDP in the state, Diran Odeyemi, in a press statement on Thursday.

The PDP, while thanking the Christain Association of Nigeria, CAN, for giving relief materials to the workers in recent months also directed its members to begin to bring foodstuff to the party’s secretariats in all the local government areas in the state so they can be distributed to the suffering workers.

The statement read in part: “The situation in the state requires much more than what religious bodies can cope with. We are calling on the National Emergency Management Authority, Red Cross Society and well- meaning Nigerians to come to the aid of the workers in the state. The situation of unpaid salaries is so bad that many of those in the employment of government have now resulted to begging to feed their family while many have attempted to hang themselves.”

Odeyemi said that during the week, a worker slumped and died at the popular Olaiya Junction, Osogbo, after begging for money to buy drugs to treat his ailment.

“We also have it on good authority that many of these helpless workers have been evicted from their rented apartments, while many others are said to be considering suicide.”

The Osun state government has been in the eye of the storm in recent months for not paying salaries of workers for over seven months. Serial protests have erupted in major parts of the state over the issue, even as the government has blamed dwindling allocations to the state coffers.