Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed of Kwara State, who is also the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state, has said that he will not retrench workers in the state’s civil service, when re-elected.

Speaking during an interactive programme organised by the Joint Kwara Labour Congress for political parties and their candidates in Ilorin, on Tuesday, Governor Ahmed, who described speculations on retrenchment as mischief, said political opponents should not politicise aspects that affect lives of other people.

The governor, who said that retrenchment exercise is undemocratic and retrogressive, added that it creates knowledge gap and poor quality civil service, stressing that, “Those experienced workers that are supposed to train younger ones would have been retrenched and this would adversely affect those that are to be trained.

“Our state runs workers-oriented government because we know workers are the engine room of our development and that of service delivery of any government. We will continue to improve on their welfare. If we sack them, we will still need to cater for them under our social security scheme,” he said.

The APC governorship candidate also said that synergy between the state and federal governments would bring about improved development and infrastructure in the state, adding that he was seeking re-election to upscale and improve upon what he had achieved in the last four years in areas of health, education, agriculture, infrastructure, water and youth employment among others.

He also said that his administration had no plan to ban commercial motorcycle, popularly referred to as Okada in the state, rather, he added that it would encourage Okada riders to own tricycles to assist transportation in the state.

Governor Ahmed also said that the use of permanent voters cards (PVC) for the forthcoming general elections would have a way to eradicate election malpractices, and enable electorate change destiny of the country for good.