The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has made a plea to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, to persuade the federal government to uphold its end of the deal by paying ASUU’s unpaid salary so that they can completely resume their studies.
The group expressed concern that the announcement that professors will get half of a month’s wage in October rather than half of the income for the previous eight months as stipulated in the Speaker’s truce could jeopardize the eight-month-long accord.
Convener of the MBMJP Joe Bukka urged the government to pay the lecturers to prevent the complete collapse of Nigeria’s public universities in response to statements attributed to university lecturers who expressed shock that they were not paid their salaries as agreed during peace talks mediated by the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Mr. Bukka opined that the failure of the Federal Government to meet its obligations to the lecturers could lead to the collapse of the fragile agreement which would compel the lecturers to down tools again.
According to him, “it took eight months to get the lecturers to call off their action and the truce was reached when the Speaker of the House of Representatives stepped in. We want to appeal that we must not allow that agreement to collapse due to failure of government to meet its commitment.
“We cannot continue to toy with the education of our children in this manner. The government should please pay the lecturers in line with the agreement reached before the action was called off.
“We also appeal to the Speaker of the House of Representatives to step into the matter and ensure that the backlog of eight months salaries were paid to the lecturers so that our public universities where children of the masses receive education are not shut again.
“Our children have all returned to school with excitement that they would continue with their studies only to receive the shocking news that their lecturers have not been paid as such they would not be receiving lectures. It is frustrating and annoying and it is obviously counting again this government and the ruling party especially in an election year.”