Follow Us on Google
•FG opts for GIFMIS payment platform
By Gabriel Dike and Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), yesterday, threatened to invoke the no pay, no work if the Federal Government (FG) fails to pay its members three and a half months withheld salaries and the arrears of earned academic allowances.
The union also warned that it would not fold its hands and watch politicians who prioritise themselves over and above the development of the country destroy public universities.
Addressing newsmen, the Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, Lagos Zone, Adelaja Odukoya, said: “If the government fails to pay the three and a half months outstanding salaries and the arrears of earned academic allowances, our union is prepared to use all legitimate means to ensure payment, including but not limited to invoking no pay, no work.
“ASUU is not afraid of going on strike. We are not slaves. Strike is a legitimate tool to seek our demands. We have done our jobs but the government refused to pay us our salaries and earned academic allowances.
“There is no court injunction that says we cannot go on strike. The last court injunction was given for a specific purpose. ASUU obeyed the court order because we are a law-abiding body and the specific purpose has ended.
“The government is not doing enough for the university system. The government does not want to work with ASUU, the same thing they are doing with the Nigeria Labour Congress. By now, we should have concluded the issue of the 2009 agreement, earned allowances and Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS). The government is not working to make the university system industrial action free.”
Odukoya listed other ASUU demands to include recall of five sacked union leaders at Lagos State University (LASU) by the state government, renegotiation of FG/ASUU 2009 agreement, proliferation of universities, funding of universities and deliberate crisis in some universities.
The zonal coordinator disclosed Nigeria is on the verge of collapse and all of its parts are being pulled along with it by the type of leaders who control its political and administrative spheres.
He warned that ASUU would not give up even a single square inch of territory to grasshoppers that seek to destroy the country and whose sole aim is the accumulation of illegal wealth.
“If Nigeria must be great, the central role of universities cannot be over emphasised. In order to perform its development mandate, our public universities, like their counterparts across the globe, must enjoy autonomy in teaching and governance.
“If things continue as it is, our union, as a patriotic union, will rise powerfully in defence of the Nigerian public universities and over-burdened and inhumanly over-taxed Nigerian people. The Nigerian government will do well to take heed before it is too late,” he said.
On funding, he said ASUU has encouraged the government to adopt the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) 15-20 per cent budgetary allocation for education in developing nations like Nigeria.
According to him, in the last 10 years, there has not been a single year where the national budget’s allotment to education exceeded 10 per cent, adding, ‘the average has been between five and six per cent.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government said it has decided to use the Government Integrated Financial Management System (GIFMIS) as payment platform for salaries and entitlements of members of ASUU.
This was contained in a circular released by the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, Didi Watson-Jack, to the National Universities Commission, National Board for Technical Education and National Commission for Colleges of Education.
The GIFMIS, which is an IT-based system for budget management and accounting, was developed by the Federal Government to improve public expenditure management processes, and enhance greater accountability and transparency across ministries and agencies. The development, apparently, is against the proposal of ASUU that the Federal Government adopts the University Transparency and Accountability Solution that its members developed for the payment of salaries and other entitlements of its members.
ASUU had insisted on not being part of IPPIS or any other payment platforms by the government, alleging that the platforms are ‘fraudulent’ and has been cheating its members by short-paying them.
The circular asked the institutions to conduct periodic biometric verification of all its staff, and also reminded them to return to the GIFMIS payment platform for effective and efficient management of its financial systems, which is still in use in the institution’s financial operations on overhead, capital and operations cost.
“This requires a prior pre-registration of all employees on the institutions’ payroll on the GIFMIS platform. Relevant schedule officers shall also be put in place to manage the GIFMIS system.”
President Bola Tinubu had approved the exemption of lecturers in the federal universities, polytechnics, colleges of education and other tertiary institutions of learning from IPPIS but ASUU members said the directive has not been effected.
