The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) Branch, staged a peaceful protest on Tuesday over the non-implementation of the reports of the visitation panels and the illegal dissolution of governing councils in federal and state universities, amongst others.
The embittered academic intellectuals added that their seven months’ salary was withheld, and they claimed, “They have paid four months’ salary, but what we have is two months’ salary.”
The Union Members, who commenced the demonstration exercise in the early hours of the day, were armed with placards with different inscriptions that read: “IPPIS is a scam,” “Give proper remuneration to lecturers,” “A nation that values education is a nation that develops,” among others.
The protesting lecturers frowned at the non-implementation of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) by the federal government.
They further called for the release of the unpaid salaries of staff on sabbatical and adjunct due to IPPIS; payment of promotion arrears; and payment of EAA.
Addressing the protesters, the union chairman, Prof. Anthony Odiwe, stated that “the protest was to draw the attention of Nigerians and students to the negligence of the present administration to their request since 2009 till date.”
He listed others as “funding of the revitalization of public universities based on the FGN-ASUU MoU of 2012, 2013, and the MoA of 2017; renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement.”
The Chairman said that “refusal to implement the agreement by the Federal Government, even partially, led to a strike in 2022.”
“We called off because of the interest in the system and our children, who are students, but instead of waiting for the government to address those issues, they started punishing us.”
“Our seven months’ salary was withheld. They claimed that they had paid four months’ salary, but what we have received is only two months’ salary.
“Even the third-party reduction that was removed from our salary has not been remitted to date,” he stated.
The Chairman, however, called on religious leaders, traditional rulers, and meaningful Nigerians to urge President Tinubu to address some, if not all, of the issues.
He emphasised that ASUU cares for the progress and development of education and the improvement of facilities for students, staff, and universities to compete favourably with other universities in the world.
“And we will continue to ask for this until the government does the needful,” Odiwe asserted.
Dr. Adeola Egbedokun, the Zonal Coordinator of Akure Zone ASUU, supported the chairman’s statement that the government has not responded to their requests over the past year.
According to him, “All efforts to officially meet with the Minister of Education, Labour, and the President himself have proved abortive, and the government has not responded to any of our requests.”
“Just before the new administration, ASUU was on strike. Then, Mr. President thought the strike would affect the election, so he called ASUU, to which they responded, as that is their character.
“But since he became president, there has been no further attention to academic issues. Let it be known to the citizenry that whatever decisions are made from now on are based on the government’s lackadaisical attitude,” Egbedokun affirmed.
He appealed to the government to rescue the universities from collapsing again, stressing that all the draft documents are with the federal government and ASUU is ready for roundtable dialogues.
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