The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has commenced an indefinite strike.
The union’s President, Biodun Ogunyemi, at a press briefing in its National Secretariat in Abuja on Monday, noted that the Federal Government had failed to address the issues raised by its members.
Already, the implementation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) had led to the withholding of salaries of lecturers who failed to register on the payment platform.
ASUU had two weeks earlier declared a warning strike during which it held meetings with government to reach an interim agreement.
In a related development, ASUU has expressed disappointment over Federal Government’s failure to implement the agreement reached with them in order to end the ongoing warning strike.
Speaking with newsmen yesterday at their University of Jos Secretariat, ASUU Zonal Coordinator for Bauchi Zone, Prof. Lawan G. Abubakar, said even the National Assembly does not “demonstrate enough muscle on the matter” whenever they meet with them and the Federal Government.
Represented by the University of Jos ASUU chairperson, Dr. Lazarus Maigoro, the Zonal Coordinator reaffirmed their commitment to the struggle, saying that there shall be no retreat and no surrender in the fight for the souls of the Nigerian public universities”.
“The Bauchi zone of ASUU, while re-iterating and reaffirming its unrelenting support to ASUU National leadership and NEC in the on-going struggle, wishes to assure the Federal Government of Nigeria that the faithful implementation of the memorandom of action (MoA) coupled with a meaningful engagement of ASUU on the IPPIS is the only way towards the resolution of this problem. There is no alternative to this.
“The adverse effects of IPPIS on the University system are so enormous as it has remained unfortified and inflexible to the system.The universities should be allowed to operate an individually independent system, controlled by their various councils and supervised by the National University Commission (NEC), in line with international standards and global best practices and not a centralized and dependent structure of the civil service.
“ASUU views the implementation of IPPIS as diversionary from the main issues in contention and is forthwith rejected. As a rider to this, ASUU is proposing an alternative to IPPIS in the universities, which is the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS), which is consistent with the University laws and accommodating to the peculiarities of the university system in Nigeria,” he said.
He stressed that “ASUU will neither be intimidated nor diverted by the antics of government”.
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