The Academic Staff Union of Universities has said that it would embark on another strike soon following the failure of the authorities honour their part of the bargain.
He said for instance 53 lecturers of the University of Ibadan have not been paid salaries for more than a year. He added that the situation was the same for several others in many state universities, such as the Ebonyi State University.
The union said a long strike is inevitable over the non-implementation of the Memorandum of Action between it and the Federal Government.
The Coordinator, Ibadan zone of ASUU, Prof Oyebamiji Oyegoke, called on Nigerians to intervene “at this critical moment before our members withdraw their services.”
He spoke with journalists on the sidelines of the celebration of the Human Rights Day on Friday after the union’s zonal meeting at the University of Ilorin.
He said university lecturers were facing severe difficulties.
“Fifty-three lecturers of the University of Ibadan have not been paid their salaries since December 2020 till date, while lecturers in the Ebonyi State University have not been paid their salaries for months and the state governor has established two more universities without paying the lecturers of the existing one,” he stated.
He said the full implementation of terms of the 2020 MoA, including funding for the revitalisation of public universities; payment of earned academic allowances, withheld salaries and promotion arrears; renegotiation of the 2009 agreement; and inconsistencies in the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System and the University Transparency and Accountability Solution, was imperative.
Oyegoke, who accused the Federal Government of insincerity in fulfilling its part of the agreement, condemned the piecemeal implementation of the contentious issues in the MoA.
“Our base line is the full implementation of the 2020 MoA freely signed by the Federal Government and the union. This calls for a lot of concern. There’s no commitment to the agreement entered into. The government is not sensitive to the welfare of workers. That’s why we’re using these channels to sensitise the people so that they won’t see us as using strike as the only tool of fighting for our demands,” he said.
“While we commend interventions of notable Nigerians in the matter, it should be stated here that it is about actions and not deliberations. These are no new demands. Some of our members have not been paid salaries since December last year and they’re still working. It shows commitment on our part.
“Selective treatment of issues in dispute instead of a comprehensive approach will no longer be acceptable to our members. We shall no longer take the issue of the welfare of our members for granted. Any treatment of MoA of 2020 that precludes its full implementation and rejection of the IPPIS will be incomplete. If it has taken ASUU’s position of resuming a suspended strike action to rouse the government from its sleep of non-implementation of the MoA of 2020, one needs to ask how many of such reminders should ASUU give before its demands are met.
“It is on the basis of the failure of the government to meet up with the promises made as attested to in the MoA of 2020 that the union is calling on Nigerians to intervene at this critical moment.”
