By Dayo Adesulu
Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU has warned that if the Federal Government fails to honour its agreement that led to the suspension of 2017 strike, it will proceed on indefinite strike.
Speaking on Tuesday during a press briefing held at ASUU Secretariat, UNILAG, its Zonal Coordinator, Professor Olusiji Sowande said the union is not interested in industrial action, urging stakeholders to prevail on the FG to honour their agreement.“Our last strike was conditional, therefore we will not give the government any ultimatum before we’ll proceed on strike.”According to him, in 2009, 2013 and 2017 Memoranda of Understanding were reached between ASUU and Federal Government which the latter failed to honour.
The key outstanding issues, he noted include: “Payment of fractions and non-payment of salaries, earned academic allowances, non-release of operational license of NUPEMCO, non-implementation of the provisions of the 2014 Pension Reform Act with respect to retired professors and their salaries, exclusion of university staff schools from funding by government. Other requirements of ASUU are funds for the revitalisation of public universities that entails implementation of Needs Assessment Report and addressing poor funding of existing state universities and proliferation of universities by their visitors.”
Sowande pointed out that the N20 billion promise made by the Federal Government on Monday was not meant for ASUU, adding that it was announced to blackmail the union. While accusing the government of playing politics with the MoA, he said: “One year after signing the MoA with government, the operational license of Nigerian Universities Pension Management Company (NUPEMCO) has not been released after submitting acceptable application to PENCOM. The promise of getting the license within two weeks of submission was not fulfilled. Instead, about two weeks ago, an approval- in-principle (AiP) was granted for the operation of NUPEMCO.
While appreciating the place of AiP in the procedures towards granting the license, certain clauses in the AiP are causes of serious concern to our members. There are doubts about the sincerity of PENCOM in granting the operational license to NUPEMCO. The generality of our members would only be fulfilled with the issuance of operational license to NUPEMCO to operate as a pension fund administrator (PFA).’’
He continued: “In the MoA of 2017, government promised that a total sum of N20 billion shall be released by the Minister of Finance, made up of N10 billion in September 2017 and another N10 billion in October 2017 as a sign of its commitment to revitalization of public universities. As at the time of signing the MoA, the revitalization fund owed by government was N220 billion. Just yesterday (Monday), it was reported in the media that N20 billion had been released to ASUU. Let me make it clear that government never released any money to our union. The manner in which the announcement was made was intended to blackmail the union. Government releases are usually made to the benefiting universities. The purported release of N20 billion is coming after one year as against one month agreed in the MoA of 2017. Our expectation is that by now, government should have offset more than N220 billion to Nigeria’s public universities as contained in the 2013 MoU to upgrade facilities and infrastructure.
“In September 2017, government announced the commencement of forensic audit of the N30 billion released for Earned Academic Allowances (EAA) in 2013, with a promise to conclude the audit within six months, offset the balance of the EAA arrears for 2009 – 2012 and mainstream the EAA into annual budgeting starting with a supplementary budget in 2018. It appears that these have been jettisoned. After one year, the forensic audit report has not been released and the balance of 2009 – 2012 EAA has not been paid. Mainstreaming of EAA into annual budgetting starting with a supplementary budget in 2018 has been repudiated.
In the light of poor funding and proliferation of state universities and recognizing the concurrence of education in the Nigerian Constitution, the opportunity for interfacing and drawing the attention of state governors to the problems of under-funding and proliferation of universities at the June 28, 2018 Summit of the National Economic Council and National Council of States was technically scuttled. It appears that the organizers were not favourably disposed to ASUU addressing governors. This was a big setback for the MoA of 2017.
States where there is proliferation of universities without proper funding of the existing ones include Ogun, Ondo, Edo, Gombe and Bayelsa. Our union is committed to the goal of revitalizing the university system and by so doing uplift the status of our country. Government pretends to appreciate the need for this and continues to pay lip service to the processes thereto.
