There are strong indications that the non-teaching staff in the Nigerian universities are set to embark on fresh industrial action following the Federal Government’s failure to meet April timeline for the implementation of Memorandum of Action (MoA) it entered with the unions.
EKO HOT BLOG had earlier reported that the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU) under the aegis of Joint Action Committee (JAC), on February 26, suspended its three-week-old strike after the unions’ leadership signed the MoA with government.
However, members of the unions have begun to mount pressure on their leadership to declare a fresh strike over the failure of the Federal Government to implement the agreement it had with the unions.
The unions lamenting that after about 14 months the Consequential Adjustment for the new minimum wage came into effect, the government is yet to start its implementation.
According to the unions, other contentious issues include inconsistencies in the implementation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), delay in renegotiation of FG/NASU and SSANU 2009 agreement, non-payment of retirement benefits of outgone members, among others.
While speaking in Abuja during the weekend, the President of SSANU, Mohammed Haruna Ibrahim, stated that the leadership of the unions may succumb to the pressure of its members if government fails to do the needful as soon as possible.
READ ALSO: Allowing Strike Action Linger Will Be Counterproductive – SSANU President
“We met with government some few months ago and we had an understanding after going on strike for three weeks. A lot of pressure was put on us; a lot of persuasion and we talked with government and saw the reason to suspend the strike because government tried to paint the picture of being sincere and we needed to give them an opportunity to do one or two things to ensure that our demands are met.
“As you are aware, our demands are not new. These are things that have been lingering for eleven years.
“We had an agreement with government in 2009 and till today, a lot of such issues are still lagging behind; especially things that involve some payments of our allowances.
“We saw reasons to suspend because we felt government was sincere and the timelines given by government – not us was that by end of April, most of these issues will be sorted. We still believe miracle can happen.
“Outside that a lot of our members are agitated, we are under a lot of pressure to go back to the trenches because even when we called our members to interact with them with pressed on them to give government a chance,” Ibrahim said.
The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, could not be reached for comments as of the time of writing this report.
However, an official in the ministry revealed that the minister had been notified of the development and has promised to wade in as soon as possible.
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