Giving his submission at the adjournment debate of the Second Ordinary Session, Hon Bakary K. Badjie said: "Our salaries for the civil servants need to be restructured at all cost. Until our salaries are restructured, the National Assembly Member and Ministers are not really representing what they are meant to represent."
He added: "We cannot continue to give bonuses to our civil servants and call it salaries. Someone is being paid D6,500 per month, which is equivalent to less than 100 euros, and this is equivalent to one hour work pay in other parts of the world."
Hon Badjie further harped on "the less pay scale of our nation”, saying, according to evaluation and statistics, grade 1 government workers should receive a salary of “nothing less than D19,000”.
"We as parliamentarians are against the Judicial Officers Remuneration bill alongside many youth who are serving in public offices. But we should be determined to better their lives by restructuring the salaries and give them better take homes," he said, adding: "We should consider how inflation is draining the nation constantly. Currently 1 Euro is at the exchange rate of D74.25. This affects our economy and leads to the price hike of commodities and other essentials; therefore, there should undoubtedly be an increase in salaries."
The Honourabe calls for collective efforts and work to come up with realistic policies "because governance is about critical thinking and coming up with solutions” to problems.
“Funds should be redirected to the right sectors to better the lives of Gambians," he appealed. "We are not anti-government or pro; rather we are against corruption, laziness and related things. If you do well we applaud you; however if you flop we are going to hold you accountable."
He urged government to invest in education especially on research, saying: "If we invest in research we will generate from it. We should be bold enough to budget adequately for the ministry of higher education to improve our education system, which will eventually lead to a progressive nation."
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