The Niger State Governor, Mohammed Bago has banned workers in the State Civil Servants from wearing Kaftan, Babanriga and flowing gowns during work hours.
The ban which affected both the male and female workers takes effect from Monday to Thursday every week. The civil servants are allowed to wear their traditional attire on Friday which is also their Jummat prayer day.
Bago announced the ban on Saturday during the presentation of land development and preparation equipment at the Brains and Hammers Rice City, Mohammed Inuwa Wushishi Farm, Chakwa Community in Wushishi Local Government Area of the State.
Handing down the directive, the governor said civil servants must dress like workers who work to create wealth and not noblemen.
The governor who spoke in Hausa Language was captured in a video which went viral said, “From Monday to Thursday there will be no Kaftan, no Babanriga. We came to work. Whoever wants to wear Babanriga should leave work. Farm that’s what we will do”.
He said his government was committed to changing the narrative and orientation that civil service was all about sitting in offices with flowing gowns and nice clothes, expending public money and doing nothing to create wealth. He said every youth, civil servants, politicians and traditional office holders must all go back to farm.
According to him, there’s wealth in farming, reinstating his earlier position that the state has no reason to be poor with its vast arable land. He said the state government was on the right track to establish the Niger State Strategic food reserve and protecting land from encroachment.
Bago used the forum to encourage youths to engage in agriculture saying the government will commence the disbursement of N250,000 each to youth and women to facilitate their farming activities.
Some Niger State civil servants who reacted to the governor’s directive said the governor’s directive is reflective of the controversial statement on Hajib for teachers made last month by the commissioner for Education, Hadiza Mohammed.
A civil servant who gave her name as Zainab Adamu said ” We don’t understand what the governor is saying that we should not wear Kaftan and Babanriga to work again. Kaftan and Babanriga are our traditional attire and he wants us to stop wearing them to the office. What does he want us to wear?”
Another civil servant, Musa Mohammed, in his reaction to the ban said, “the governor may have to consider making available wardrobe allowance for the civil servants. We grew up wearing Kaftan and Babanriga and now he wants us to wear something different. I personally don’t have such types of attires he expects me to wear. I believe he knows what he is doing.”
