ASUU moves to sanction chapters over non-compliance with ongoing strike

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has moved against its members in some chapters who have failed to comply with its decision to continue with the strike, threatening to sanction them.

This follows a report that a few members of the lecturers’ union have pulled out of the ongoing industrial action to resume academic activities.

ASUU President, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, during an interview on Monday in Abuja, said that ASUU will punish those who have pulled out from the ongoing strike the appropriate way.

He said, “We will ensure to query them and we will follow it up the appropriate way. We have even queried some of them in accordance with the union.’’

Osodeke also noted that since the last Tripartite Plus meeting called by the Chief of Staff to the President on the ongoing industrial action over a month ago, there has been no other meeting, adding that nothing concrete came out of the last meeting that was held at the villa.

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He said, “We have not been called for any other meeting since that time and government did not offer us anything, they just ask us to meeting with the committee that was all.’’

He also said that the union will be meeting with the government within the week.

Recall that on February 14, ASUU embarked on a 4-week total and comprehensive strike to press home their unresolved demands on the federal government.

Some of the lecturers’ demands include funding for the revitalisation of public universities, payment of earned academic allowances, adoption of the University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS) as a preferred payment option, instead of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) and payment of promotion arrears.

Others are the renegotiation of the 2009 ASUU-FGN Agreement and the resolution of inconsistencies in the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS).

The union on March 14, extended the industrial action by another 2 months, hinting at the lack of seriousness on the part of the federal government to address the issues.

Several attempts at negotiations between the union and the federal government have proven futile with both sides accusing each other of insincerity and unseriousness.

ASUU on May 9, further extended its ongoing strike by another 12 weeks, to give the government enough time to satisfactorily resolve all the outstanding issues.

Meanwhile, there have been reports that representatives of the federal government and ASUU are expected to resume talks today (Monday, June 13, 2022).