About 100 disengaged workers of the Rivers State Sustainable Development Agency (RSSDA) have secured leave from the Court of Appeal sitting in Port Harcourt to challenge a decision of the National Industrial Court over their unpaid salaries and employment status.
The workers, who said their salaries had stopped since 2017, are seeking to compel the Rivers State Government and the RSSDA to pay their outstanding wages and other entitlements.
The workers had previously approached the National Industrial Court in Port Harcourt, which in October 2021 delivered a declaratory judgment stating that their employment remained valid and that the RSSDA and the Rivers State Government were co-employers until their employment status was formally determined.
The court also directed the Rivers State Government, under the then Governor Nyesom Wike, to pay the workers their salaries and other emoluments.
The workers, however, alleged that the government had yet to comply with the judgment.
They subsequently returned to the National Industrial Court to seek enforcement of the judgment and an order compelling the immediate payment of their outstanding salaries and entitlements.
The court declined to grant the enforcement order, citing a pending appeal.
Dissatisfied with the decision, the workers approached the Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt, seeking leave to challenge the ruling.
At Monday’s proceedings, counsel to the applicants, Isa Saidu, told the court that the appeal was filed on 17 July 2025 and sought permission to challenge the decision of the lower court.
Counsel representing the RSSDA and the Rivers State Government, H.N. Amadi, a Deputy Director in the Rivers State Ministry of Justice, did not oppose the application.
After hearing both sides, the presiding judge, Justice Elfrieda Williams-Dawodu, granted the workers leave to appeal the decision of the National Industrial Court.
Speaking to journalists after the proceedings, Saidu said the workers were dissatisfied with the refusal of the lower court to enforce the payment of their salaries on the basis of an alleged pending appeal.
He maintained that there were no court records showing that an appeal had been filed against the original 2021 judgment.
“Since the October 2021 judgment, the Rivers State Government has not complied with that judgment. Since the judgments were declaratory, we have now filed another suit with the amount due to them computed to be over N3 billion, and still running because the employments are not determined,” Saidu said.
He said the National Industrial Court had agreed with the workers’ position but declined to make an order compelling payment because it believed an appeal was pending at the Court of Appeal.
Saidu, however, argued that what existed was only an application for leave to appeal and not a substantive appeal.
He also expressed concern over the hardship allegedly suffered by the affected workers since their salaries were stopped.
Saidu claimed that one of the workers had died by suicide as a result of the financial difficulties arising from the prolonged dispute.
The Court of Appeal’s decision allows the workers to proceed with their appeal against the lower court’s ruling.
