Popular social media activist Martins Vincent Otse, known as VeryDarkMan (VDM), led a protest with schoolchildren in front of the Abuja home of Nyesom Wike, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, NaijNaira can report.
According to News, the protest was sparked by Wike’s move to cut 10% of the area councils’ statutory allocations because of their refusal to pay the new minimum wage for primary school teachers, which has kept schools shut.
The Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) has been on strike since March 24 over the non-payment of the ₦70,000 minimum wage by the Chairmen of the six Area Councils in the FCT.
VDM, voicing his frustration on Facebook, urged the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to intervene immediately.
“For over 9 weeks, our public primary school kids in the Federal Capital Territory have been out of school,” VDM said.
He added, “They claimed teachers are being paid 80 thousand naira and above, but the truth is, they are still being paid 30 thousand naira and some are owed salaries.”
At the protest, VDM criticized, “@officialasiwajubat this is not the future you promised Nigerians. Our children will never get a better future without this basic education.”
VDM directly called on the EFCC: “Please we demand a deep investigation on the salary board to fix this mess and send our kids back to school.”
On Monday, VDM gathered children in school uniforms outside Wike’s gate, teaching them the alphabet.
“S for Suegbe, T for Tinubu, W for Wike,” he chanted, and the children repeated after him.
VDM boldly declared that Wike’s gate would now become the pupils’ new classroom until the strike ends.
Just last week, VDM also appeared in Makurdi, Benue State, supporting youth protests calling for an end to the killings affecting local communities.
Article updated 3 weeks ago. Content is written and modified by multiple authors.