The former Head of Service of the Federation, Mr Stephen Oronsaye, has dismissed insinuations that the merger of government agencies and parastatals will lead to increase in unemployment rate.

Oronsaye made this known in an interview with newsmen in Abuja yesterday.

He dismissed the fear being expressed in some quarters that the merger would render a lot of people jobless as baseless.

Oronsaye said the Presidential Committee on the Rationalisation and Restructuring of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies, recommended the “Traffic Light Model” to address such challenge.

“The merger of some agencies and parastatals with similar mandates will not lead to unemployment as insinuated. People should go and read the report,’’ he said.

According to him, the model categorised workers into Green, Amber and Red to ensure proper screening and that only redundant workers will be laid off in the process.

Oronsaye explained that green represented qualified and active workers, adding that such workers would be absorbed.

He further explained that amber represented workers who required adequate training while workers in the red category would be laid off for non-performance.

“The model that is recommended in the report is the Traffic Light Model, green, amber and red.

“If you are green you remain, if you are amber you will be trained and if you are red, it means stop, you are of no use,’’ he said.

The Tide source reports that reactions have been trailing the decision of the Federal Government to merge some parastatals, agencies and departments with similar mandates.

The committee which was chaired by Oronsaye had in April, 2012 recommended the scrapping, merger or reversal of some agencies of government to cut down on cost of governance.