The Public Treasury Department has failed to send money allocated for local government to any of the local districts, preventing them from paying staff on the various islands for weeks.
The department says it is holding up the funds because it requested reports from leaders of the various districts but only four of them submitted the documents. However, officials on the family islands suspect this is just an excuse as the four compliant districts have not received their money either.
As a result, contractual workers, including garbage collectors, local government employees, handymen, secretaries and cleaning crews have not received their pay cheques for September or the first part of October.
Why is the Treasury holding up on their hard-earned money? Is the public purse low on cash?
Those family island workers are counting on their money to support their families during the economic crisis, which has been compounded by a series of harsh restrictions, including lockdowns and curfews.
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