STRIKE: ASUU to make their decision soon check the date ASUU is likely to go for Strike 2024
Cursory: At Niger Delta University, the ASUU NEC meeting took place to talk about important matters like setting up living expenses, pay delays, and ongoing use of IPPIS.
The National Executive Council (NEC) of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has met at Niger Delta University (NDU), Wilberforce Island, Bayelsa State. The two-day meeting started on Saturday and is scheduled to end either early on Monday morning or on Saturday evening. Its main topics of discussion will be the rising expense of living, member salaries withheld, January salary payments delayed, and the continued use of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) for salary disbursements.
The No-Work-No-Pay policy that President Muhammadu Buhari’s predecessor had imposed on striking academics was reversed by President Bola Tinubu last year. Due to their participation in an extended eight-month strike, university employees’ salaries were withheld by the Buhari government from them until the end of his presidency as a result of this policy. The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) of Universities and Allied Institutions, the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU), and the National Association of Academic Technologists (NAAT) are among the unions that are affected. After lengthy negotiations with pertinent parties, Mr Tinubu declared in October 2023 that the government would reimburse four of the eight months’ salaries that had been withheld. Nevertheless, it has been alleged that these withheld payments are still unpaid four months later.
Lecturers have also drawn attention to the fact that the January wage was only paid out on a Friday, which was nine days into February. A lecturer who wished to remain anonymous expressed frustration, pointing out that even after four months, the President’s decision had not been followed, resulting in accumulated arrears.
This newspaper was told by an instructor who wishes to remain anonymous. Therefore, I can assure you that ASUU will make some important decisions at the NEC meeting in light of the high rate of inflation, growing cost of living, and unfulfilled requests.
The government has decided to keep Nigerian tertiary institutions—universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education—out of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), according to a December 2023 announcement made by Minister of Education Tahir Mamman. A centralised payment system called IPPIS is now being used.
All federal government employees are paid using the centralised IPPIS payment system, which ASUU has continuously challenged.
ASUU stated that one of the requirements for pausing the industrial action it started in 2022 was exemption from IPPIS. Three months later, academics complained that the January payments, which were paid out on a Friday, were still processed through the IPPIS platform, which they deemed insufficient, despite Mamman’s assurances and additional commitments made in January.
