THE Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has hinted at another strike action, saying that the federal government has breached the agreement reached with the union in December 2020.
According to a report by The Punch, Ayo Akinwole, chairman of ASUU, University of Ibadan, said this on Sunday, stating that another strike action might be inevitable.
Akinwole was quoted to have said that the government had refused to pay the salaries of some of its members.
The ASUU chairman said the government’s action was a breach of ‘no victimisation clause’ agreement reached before the nine months strike was suspended.
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“The suspension of the strike was based on an agreement reached and a ‘Memorandum of Action’ signed in good faith between the government and ASUU at the stakeholders’ meeting held on Tuesday, 22nd December 2020,” Akinwole said.
However, he lamented that the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation had made the payment difficult due to the demand for ‘loads of paper work’ from the union and bursary units of various universities.
“The requested documents have consistently been provided on a monthly basis, yet the salaries remain unpaid. In the University of Ibadan, March 10, 2021, about 67 ASUU members that are on regular nominal payroll have their salaries ranging from two to 10 months still unpaid as of March 10, 2020.
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“Over 80 ASUU-UI members in the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine have their medical allowances of over eight months still unpaid,” Akinwole added.
Biodun Ogunyemi, national president of ASUU, was not available for comments as calls and text messages sent to him were not responded to as of the time of filing this report.
Lukman Abolade is an Investigative reporter with The ICIR. Reach out to him via [email protected], on twitter @AboladeLAA and FB @Correction94