Jennifer Ugwueke
After several deliberations most of which were characterised by deadlock, the Federal Government has made an agreement with the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU.
The government on Thursday, October 15, resolved to pay University lecturers under the umbrella of ASUU the sum of N30 billion earned academic allowances, Dgovscoops reports.
According to the Minister of Employment, Labour and Productivity, Chris Ngige, the money will be paid in instalments from May 2021 to January 2022. In addition, to put an end to the seven-month-long strike by the union, government has agreed to release N20bn meant for the revitalisation of the education sector.
However, ASUU insisted that the funds should be paid through the government Integrated Financial Management Information System (GIFMIS) while the University Transparency Account System (UTAS) is still in the works despite the Government’s insistence on the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).
Meanwhile, the leadership of ASUU has directed its members to reject IPPIS officials allegedly coming to various University campuses on Monday, October 19, for biometric data capturing.
A letter by the union’s President, Biodum Ogunyemi, to this end read: “We have received information that IPPIS officials from the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation will be visiting campuses as from Monday 19th October, 2020, for biometric data capture of academics. “All ASUU members should have nothing to do with them. Fact-Check by ASUU with the figures from the OAGF has proven the claim that our members are trooping to enroll in the IPPIS in Abuja as false.
“The leadership of our great Union is fully aware of the hardship the non-payment of salaries by the Accountant-General and other forms of intimidation by over-zealous Vice-Chancellors have unleashed on our membership and we are leaving no stone unturned to redress the situation.”
Earlier, the Federal Government denied speculations that it had replaced the IPPIS platform with UTAS. ASUU came up with the UTAS platform in a protest against the Federal Government’s IPPIS.