Strike Actions, ASUU’s Weapon to get FG’s Attention
By Mercy Ombu
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has declared a two(2) weeks warning strike to protest the non-payment of salaries of lecturers that are not enrolled in the Federal Government’s Integration Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS).
This declaration was made by the National President of the union Biodun Ogunyemi after the ASUU National Executive Council meeting held on March 7th, 8th 2020 in Enugu State.
The Many Failed Agreement Between FG And ASUU
The President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities said the strike action was to demand that Federal Government implements the agreement and resolution of Memorandum of action it had with the union from 2009, 2013, 2017 and 2019. The agreement and resolution of a memorandum of action between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities was reached at the negotiations which included conditions of service for the university lecturers, funding of universities, staff loans, and breakdown of lecturers’ salary structure, pensions, overtime, and moderation of examination. It also included academic freedom and issues that require the law to implement.
Part of the agreement was based on the funding of universities where both parties acknowledged that each federal university should get at least N1.5 trillion between the year 2009 and 2011, while the state universities within the same period receive N3.6 million per student.
However, the agreement had parts that the government was only able to allocate about 26 percent of Nigeria’s annual budget to education and half of that allocation to the universities. This agreement was signed by Dr. Bolanle Babalakin the former Chairman of Committee of Pro-Chancellors of the Federal Universities.
It is uncertain how much of the agreement have been implemented by the government. The former secretary to the federation in 2009, Pius Anyim, after one of the recently failed negotiations, said that most of the issues contained in the 2009 agreement, had been fully met except for the earned allowances estimated at N92 billion.
ASUU’s Unending Battle with FG on the IPPIS
The Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System is an information communication technology (ICT) project initiated by the Federal Government of Nigeria to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of payroll administration for its ministries which includes the Federal Universities. The IPPIS is a department under the office of the Accountant General of the Federation responsible for payment of salaries and wages directly to Government employee’s bank account with appropriate deductions and remittance of third party payments.
The lecturers in the nation’s public universities under the backing of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) have been issuing threats of yet another strike. This time, it is over the move by the federal government towards ensuring that all its workers, including lecturers in federal universities, are enrolled under the unified salary scheme Integrated Payroll and Personal Information System (IPPIS).
The federal government came up with an idea IPPIS in 2006 to control the payment of salaries of workers with a view to detecting fraud. Since then, the university lecturers have refused to be enrolled in the program.
Meanwhile, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, had directed all Federal Government workers to enrol in the IPPIS to ensure transparency.
There were times the leadership of the National Assembly persuaded the lecturers to dialogue with the federal government on the issue. While there were indeed negotiations, the decision by ASUU to insist on not complying with IPPIS remains the obstacle.The union should be at the forefront of supporting the introduction of digital payrolls in the public service since it has helped to reduce the fraud of multiple payments to ghost workers except they have something they are hiding. The union cannot be an advocate of transparency and accountability only when it concerns others in the public sector.
As ASUU continues to oppose IPPIS, relevant questions remain unanswered. What really is the starting point of the fear of the lecturers? Is it because it will block the opportunity of lecturing in more than one university and drawing salaries from more than one university?These are the issues the leadership of the academic union needs to ponder on and remember the saying that he who goes to equity must go with clean hands...
The ASUU branch chairman Dr. Christina Opata said in an interview that the Integrated Payroll System was defective and full of corruption. She also said “the federal Government has not told Nigerians the truth about what it wants to achieve through the IPPIS, because the IPPIS itself is an embodiment of corruption”.
However, there happen to be many people who are on the payroll under IPPIS yet they are not working anywhere (Ghost workers). ASUU has been locked in a protracted dispute with the Nigerian government over issues connected to poor funding of public universities.
Every time the dispute resolved over to strike by the teachers, negotiations between the two parties always produced agreements which the federal government never seems to honor most of the times. However, the government’s failure to meet the teacher’s expectations within the context of the agreements has been a major concern.
ASUU strike illegal, And An Act of Corruption – FG
The Federal Government of Nigeria has openly condemned the recent two-week warning strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities illegal. It accused ASUU of not obeying laid down procedures before going on the industrial action.
The Minister of Labor and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, said this in Abuja while stating the government’s position on the strike after the Federal Executive Council meeting on Wednesday.
He said ASUU did not give the government the “mandatory notice” required before a union could proceed on strike. He then said for ASUU to have defiled the laid down procedures, it is tantamount to corruption for the university teachers to go on strike. The minister said, “I am in shock.
“If you withdraw services and you still want to be paid, it is corruption. Is that not corruption?”
Ngige, however, added that he had contacted the leadership of ASUU and invited it to a meeting on Thursday (today) to discuss the issues raised by the union.
But he warned that the government would not succumb to threats by ASUU, arguing that “no employee should dictate to an employer.”
The government’s target is to eliminate ‘ghost workers.’ But, ASUU has unswervingly kicked against it on the grounds that it would not suit the university system.
Ngige said the government final position is the use of IPPIS. He noted that after the union visited the President earlier in the year, the government stood its ground on the IPPIS. He confirmed that they agreed that the IPPIS and ASUU’s UTAS could be harmonized after all the grey areas had been sorted out.
ASUU has been on strike almost every year since 1999.
