By Anastasia Agunwa :
The Federal Government has said it could only afford a 23.5 per cent salary increase for all categories of the workforce in federal universities, except for the professorial cadre, which will enjoy a 35 per cent upward review.
This is just as President Muhammadu Buhari warned the government team involved in the negotiation with the striking Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) against signing any agreement, which the government will not be able to implement.
The president also directed the government team to persuade the university lecturers to return to work.
The Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, spoke in Abuja yesterday during a meeting with pro-chancellors and vice chancellors of federal universities on decisions reached by the government to end the ongoing ASUU strike.
Adamu said after a series of meetings with Buhari and the ministers of finance, budget and national planning; labour and productivity; communications and digital economy; and education as well as the Director-General of the Budget Office and the Chairman of the Salaries and Wages Commission, the Draft Agreement by Nimi Briggs Re-negotiation Team was critically reviewed.
He added that the proposed salary increment considered unrealistic and out of tune with the current realities of the national economy.
He also assured that henceforth, allowances pertaining to ad-hoc duties of academic and non-academic staff shall be paid as and when due by the governing councils of universities to which such services are rendered and to the staff who perform them.
Academic activities have been suspended by ASUU for over 200 days over the alleged failure of the federal government to meet all its demands.
The ASUU demands include the conclusion of the process of renegotiating the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement, deployment of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS), payment of outstanding arrears of Earned Academic Allowances (EAA), release of the agreed sum of money for the revitalisation of public universities (federal and states), address proliferation and governance issues in the state universities, settle promotion arrears, release withheld salaries of academics, and pay outstanding third-party deductions.
Adamu also said that a sum of N150 billion shall be provided for in the 2023 budget as funds for the revitalisation of federal universities, to be disbursed to the institutions in the first quarter of the year.
He stated that the sum of N50 billion shall also be provided for in the 2023 budget for the payment of outstanding areas of earned academic allowances, to be paid in the first quarter of the year.
While noting that the prevailing economic situation is limiting the ability of the government to accede to all their demands, Adamu said the appeal to the unions to consider and accept the government’s offer and call off the ongoing industrial actions in the interest of the nation’s educational system consequently saw the suspension of the strike by Joint Action Committee of NASU/SSANU and NAAT.
He said government and the ASUU had no option but to continue talking “Until our universities have reopened their doors to students who, clearly, are the principal victims of the seemingly unending strikes. In the circumstances, therefore, all councils and senates of our universities are enjoined to rise up to their responsibilities.
“We must, together, continue to work to restore our public universities to where they were in the 60s and 70s. As the most important officers in our university system, pro-chancellors and vice-chancellors, must demonstrate more commitment to ending the ongoing strike,” he added.
He said the government negotiation team, in all its activities, had been guided by Buhari’s directives, namely, “That while the unions should be persuaded to return to work, the government should not repeat the past mistakes of accepting to sign an agreement it will be unable to implement. Government should not, in the guise of resolving current challenges, sow seeds for future disruptions.”
Meanwhile, after a closed-door meeting of over two hours with the pro-chancellors and vice-chancellors, the minister, through the Director of Public Affairs, Bem Ben Goong, said a committee made up of four pro-chancellors and four vice-chancellors and others, to be chaired by the minister, had been constituted.
Members of the committee include Nimi Briggs, Olu Obafemi, Udo Udoma and Bashir Dalhatu and the vice-chancellors of the University of Ibadan, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, the University of Benin and the University of Nigeria, Nsukka with the NUC executive secretary and four others.
The minister said the committee would look into the additional demands the ASUU was making, particularly the areas where there had not been consensus.
He said the committee met yesterday and would proceed to meet President Buhari on the outcome.
He noted that the committee would be looking at two major areas of contention: the no-work-no-pay policy and the remuneration of university lecturers.
While he could not give the time frame for the committee to work, he said “Given the atmosphere in the meeting, they are looking at days.”
He, however, said they were not jettisoning the Briggs committee, but that it was in continuation of what the committee did.
On whether there would be a review of the no-work-no-pay policy, he said: “There has been an appeal generally for the system to take a second look at that and that is what the committee will look into.”
Reacting to the announcement on salary percentage increment, ASUU President, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, in an interview, asked the government to sign and implement the agreements already reached.
He alleged that yesterday’s offers by the federal government were not in good faith, saying it was basically to blackmail members of the union.
“We’re not talking about percentage, we‘re talking about the agreement, not percentage. How much did they present to us that they would give the academics during negotiations? Like we’ve insisted, we don’t accept gifts, we accept negotiated money.
“When you give us something, you can take it back the next day. But when we negotiate and sign the agreements, it’s binding on both parties. We’re talking about negotiated amounts, not percentage given,” he stated.
Asked to disclose the negotiated amount, Osodeke said, “Don’t worry, you’ll see that they’ve not finished. When they finish, the world will know. In collective bargaining, you don’t let out whatever you’re negotiating until you finish.
The alumni associations across federal universities yesterday asked President Buhari to personally involve himself in resolving the face-off between the government and the ASUU.
The associations, under the aegis of Concerned Alumni of Nigerian Universities (CANU), said the continued closure of Nigerian universities has increased the spate of terrorism, banditry, kidnappings, money rituals, prostitution and other social vices.
They said this in a statement jointly signed by the President of the University of Lagos Alumni Association who is also the Chairman of Channels Television Media Group, John Momoh and the National Chairman of the Conference of Alumni Associations of Nigerian Universities for ABU Alumni Association, Prof. Ahmed Tijani Mora.
Other signatories were President, University of Ibadan Alumni, Prof. Elsie Adewoye; President, University of Calabar Alumni Association, Prof. Yakubu Aboki Ochefu; President, University of Jos Alumni Association, Nuhu Sani and President, University of Port Harcourt Alumni Association, Ule Williams Glad.
They said no country aspiring to get to the Promised Land and be a member of the comity of enlightened nations would toy with education.
The statement read, “In this connection, the associations call on the federal government to urgently put in place a mechanism to holistically address the concerns and demands of the striking lecturers and other university staff.
“A situation where millions of students are locked out of campuses portends grave danger for the country. The associations call on the Presidency to wade into the matter as a matter of utmost concern so that all contending issues are speedily and expeditiously resolved”.
The associations also pleaded with the leadership of ASUU to sheath its sword and call off its strike as it had made its point.
