By Suzan Edeh

Bauchi—Placard  carrying secondary school teachers yesterday stormed Government House, Bauchi State to protest eleven months unpaid salaries.

The teachers, who arrived at Government House around 9am, refused to leave despite the scorching heat of the sun.

Our correspondent gathered that they consisted mainly of newly recruited teachers under the Bauchi State ministry of education.

The protesters carried placards which had inscriptions such as “I cannot feed because I have not been paid salary”; “ How can you work without salaries?”; “We cannot feed our families, we are suffering”

The teachers demanded that Bauchi State government paid them their eleven months salary which they had not been paid since the commencement of their employment.

The protesters said they could no longer bear the sufferings as a result of unpaid salaries and urged the government to address the situation.

Engineer Tijani Abubakar, who spoke on behalf of the protesters, lamented that since the state government employed the new teachers on April 16, 2014, they had not been paid.

He said: “ In the spirit of leadership by example, we want Governor Isa Yuguda to intervene and address this situation because we are suffering.

“The situation is even more pathetic for those of us who were posted to remote areas in the local government.

“How can teachers transport, feed and accommodate themselves in a local government without salaries? This is an inhuman treatment on human beings.

“For eleven months now, what we have always been hearing from the Ministry of Education and Accountant-General is that we should be patient. But we discovered that the situation has continued to deteriorate.

“The state government recruited 2,000 graduates as teachers under the Ministry of Education and paid some of us two months salary in December, 2014.