…What we discussed with president –ASUU

 James Ojo, Abuja

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), yesterday, frowned at the impression created that its meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari was solely on the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) which the Union insisted it will not enrol in.

Explaining what transpired at the January 9 meeting with the president and some ministers, ASUU President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi in a statement said six prayers were brought to the table for debate.

They include the need for appropriate officers to obey universities’ laws and abide by collective bargaining agreements; The need for the implementation of all outstanding provisions in the 7 February 2019 FGN/ASUU Memorandum of Action;

The need to re-commence and conclude the Re-negotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU Agreement based on ILO’s collective bargaining principles within the sky-week timeframe originally set for it and the  need for Mr. President, as Visitor to the Federal Universities, to constitute and activate Visitation Panels to all Universities and direct that the outcomes be fully implemented.

Other issues was that government should welcome ASUU’s ongoing innovation of a more robust system of human resource management and compensation, called the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS), which will address the peculiarities of universities and end inappropriate recruitments in the system.

The need for government to declare a five-year state of emergency in the education sector, during which at least, 6 per cent of the GDP or 26 per cent of the FGN Budget as well as 26 percent of each state government budget should be allocated to education during the period.

Prof. Ogunyemi stated that President Buhari agreed with ASUU that education, particularly university education, holds the key to the future of the country and that the minister of education has a lot of work to do after which he handed over the position paper of ASUU on the issues raised to the minister for follow up.

The union leader said they were not surprised at the meeting when the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning spoke spiritedly in defence of IPPIS and levelled some unfounded allegations against ASUU, in order to portray the Union in bad light before Mr. President, but that the Minister of Labour and Employment, and Secretary to Government of the Federation) alluded to the possibility of “marrying” ASUU’s proposed UTAS with IPPIS.