Academics at Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti (EKSU) have said they will begin strike from April 22, after the expiration of their four week notice.
The lecturers said the industrial action was necessary to protest alleged neglect of the university and its workers by the state government and the institution’s management.
The ASUU Chairman, EKSU chapter, Dr Kayode Arogundade, who stated this when he led other executive members to address reporters on the campus, said the lecturers are wallowing in abject poverty due to alleged neglect of the institution.
Arogundade said that now fewer than 10 members of staff of EKSU had died due to the inability to pay medical bills from treatable ailments in the last three years.
The ASUU Chairman stated that EKSU that is State owned, could not boast of any singular infrastructural facility put in place by the current State Government, since its inception in 2018.
“As at today, Ekiti State Government is only subventing EKSU by 50% of its monthly wage bills, without paying any considerable attention to capital grants and infrastructural developments.
“This has led EKSU Administration to ingloriously indulge in financial infractions, such as: Subversion of Tax Deductions to paying salaries
Diversion of Pension deductions to paying salaries, fund diversion from various units of the University (Health Centre, ICT, Faculties and Directorates). By this, all these Units are left in absolute neglect and disarray.
“Despite various appeals made to eminent personalities in the State to help call the attention of Government to the survival of the University, it appears the current Governor of the State has defiantly made up his mind to punish EKSU to its grave.”
Arogundade accused Governor Kayode Fayemi of reneging on his promise to offset five months arrears of subvention being owed the University, within the first six months of assumption of office, saying, “ordinarily, it should not take the “brilliant and performing Governor” 3 years to defray the 5 months arrears of subventions being owed the University.
“It is important to state herein that as at today, our workers are being owed the followings: 3 months arrears of salaries for the months of July, August and September, 2018; 6 years arrears of Earned Academic Allowances, 26 months unremitted pension deductions and 14 months arrears of half salaries.”
He said that the Union, in the spirit of collective bargaining, had met with critical stakeholders in the University and Ekiti State more than Seventeen times since the inauguration of the current Administration.
“Despite all efforts by our Union to embrace the spirit of collective bargaining, neither the Governor, University Council nor EKSU Administration deemed it fit to see to how our plights could be bettered and ameliorated. Rather, it has been unkept promises, continuously and unendingly running for 3 years, as if the education of our citizens is of no priority to them.
“We don’t want to die before our money is paid. We are tired of promises. The Governor has denied us access to interact with him. He has called our bluff,” he added.
The commissioner said the Emergency Flood Abatement Gangs (EFAG) of the ministry has been de-silting and working on linkages to the secondary and primary channels, to enable them discharge efficiently and act as retention basins.
He said the government is determined to maintain the long-established synergy and partnership with the Ogun-Oshun River Basin Authority, which has ensured control and monitoring of the steady and systemic release of water from Oyan Dam, to prevent flooding of the downstream reaches.
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