National president of Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), Dr Nasir Idris has threaten that the union would confront any governor who refuses to implement the new salary structure for secondary and primary school teachers as announced by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Dr Idris who disclosed this while speaking with journalists said the union expects the implementation of the new structure to commence by the first quarter of the next year 2021.
President Buhari had during the 2020 World Teachers’ Day in October announced a new special salary scale for teachers among other welfare packages.
Last month, the Federal Ministry of Education set up a committee to look into the modalities of making the salary scale effective.
Idris hailed the president’s decision as prove of him being a lover of education for the grassroots.
He said, “We have been into this agitation for the past 27 years, and no government has listened to us. It was this present administration that found it worthy to listen to the grassroots teachers, that’s the Primary and Secondary school.
“We have put on some demands which the president promised to look into, and fortunately, during world teachers’ day, the president approved new salary structures for primary and secondary school, Housing for primary and secondary school and even the extension of time of service.”
On whether the state governments would be willing to implement the president’s pronouncement, Idris who is also a deputy president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) answered in affirmation, adding that teachers would engage governors on that.
He is optimistic that the committee put in place to work out modalities for the implementation would finish her work by the end of 2020.
“The committee for the new salary scale is now in place, the ministry of education is involved, the head of the service is involved as well as salary and wages commission, so once the circular comes out, we will send the circular to the various state government and I know that the FG will also send letters to the state government so that they’ll comply.
“We hope that when the committee finishes their work, hopefully by next year the teachers will start enjoying their new salary structure. Because when you look at it, November is already ending and it hasn’t been long since the committee was inaugurated, so God willing, they’ll start enjoying that soon.
“But the housing is not something that will happen immediately, all these housing programs and schemes, they hardly look at teachers, but this time around, the houses would be built in different local governments and villages, and so, they’ll enjoy the benefits.
“We don’t expect the issues to reach the end of the first quarter of next year, because we know the kind of people we have in the committee, and NUT is part of the committee. So we hope they’ll finish the job before the Christmas break so that beginning of next year, we’ll start pestering the government to implement the president’s approval.
“By the time the committee finishes, we will confront the state government to approve, this is not the first time we are confronting them,” he said.
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