ASUU threatens fresh strike over half salaries, says “only casual workers receive pay prorate”

Members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities(ASUU) on Monday warned the federal government against the fresh crisis in the nation’s Universities that would surpass all previous ones.

The union said they cannot and would not continue to do free work that would not be remunerated.

Speaking with journalists in Ilorin shortly after a protest embarked on by the members of the union, the University of Ilorin branch, the former ASUU chairman of the university and a council member of the union, Professor Rasheed Adeoye, and the Secretary of the union in the university, Dr. Olatunji Abdulganiyu, described half salaries reportedly paid by the government to members of the union for October as unacceptable, saying it would be resisted.

The union leaders said, “As a law-abiding union, we have heeded the directive of the court which directed that we resume our duty posts while the substantive matter is being heard.

“However, after the resumption from the strike and to our utmost dismay, the government decided, that half of salaries be paid to our members for the month of October 2022. This development is unacceptable and would be resisted by our union.

“The fact is that academics are not casual workers. Only casual workers receive pay prorate. The law of the land is also clear on this; indeed, the National Industrial Court made it clear in a landmark judgment in 2020 that tenured staff cannot be paid pro rata.

“It is very sad that the Minister of Labour is ignorant of the fact that academic staff engages in so many activities aside from teaching duties. In fact, the primary duty of academic staff is research, and there are other activities such as that that continue to engage their attention irrespective of strike action or whether the school is in session or not”.

They added, “Gentlemen of the press, let me assure you that our union is resolved to continue to call the attention of the government to its responsibilities despite the obnoxious treatment being meted out to us by the government.

“To this effect, though we have resumed work in our university, the government’s ignoble stance of withholding our eight months’ salaries, which is based on its ill-advised policy of “No work, No Pay” is set to trigger fresh crises. In the coming days, the union would respond by considering invoking the “No Pay, No work policy and would abandon the works that have accumulated for that period which the government has falsely claimed that our members have not worked.

“Members of the public are hereby sensitized and put on notice again that a fresh crisis, which would surpass all previous ones, is looming again in Nigeria Universities as our members cannot and would not continue to do free work that would not be remunerated.

“We hope that with this notice, all relevant stakeholders, who have the ears of the government would act fast before the fragile peace restored on our campuses nationwide collapse.

“Our union and its members should not be held responsible for the consequences that its actions, in response to the crude wickedness of the Nigerian state, would have on all stakeholders”.

The ASUU leaders said that the demands of the union, for the records, included, the “Release of Revitalisation Fund to the public institutions in the country, Release of White paper of Visitation Panels to public universities which our union forced the government to convene, Renegotiation of the 2009 ASUU/ FGN Agreement and the termination of the obnoxious, ineffective and corrupt laden IPPIS as payment platform in the Nigeria public University system, among others”.