The chairperson of the steering committee for Jubek State Workers Union has called on the government to increase workers’ salaries and institute the payment of pension.

Addressing the press on Tuesday in Juba after their annual meeting, Matthew Alisandro Sule said Jubek State workers are facing a lot of challenges including a delay of salaries for several months and lack of payment of pension.

He explained that some workers are paid 250 SSP in a month, which he says cannot buy a jerrican of water or a sack of charcoal for the family. Alisandro said they have urged the ministry of finance to look into the issue.

Jubek state finance minister, John Euginio Laku, called on the state workers to be patient with the government saying they do not have money due to the ongoing economic crises facing the country.

In November, President Salva Kiir Mayardit confessed that the country is broke, citing the country’s troubled economy. The former deputy finance minister Mou Ambrose Riiny Thiik also said recently that the government has run out of cash.