The Academic Staff Union of Universities University of Uyo Branch, ASUU-UUB, has staged a peaceful protest over the failure of the Federal government to honour the Memorandum of Action, MOA, it reached with the union in December 2020.
The protesters marched to the entrance of the University town campus, Uyo bearing placards of various inscriptions such as ‘End this unholy act Now’, ‘UNIUYO lecturers are endangered’, ‘Protect our only university from collapse” among others.
Earlier, the ASUU University of Uyo in an enlarged meeting, which had other unions such as the Non-academic Staff Union, NASU, Senior Staff Union of Universities, SSANU, in attendance resolved to join the planned nation-wide and indefinite strike when called upon.
Addressing journalists after the protest chairperson ASUU, University of Uyo Branch, Dr. Happiness Uduk, lamented insensitivity of the current and successive Federal governments towards their welfare.
Her words: “Remember that when our union suspended it’s strike in December 2020 the condition was that the union would resume the strike without any notice to the government if the federal government failed to honour the terms upon which that strike was suspended.
“Today, well over one year later, we regret to inform the Nigerian public that the Government has shown no sincerity to those terms, and nothing much has changed.
“We have waited most patiently for the Government for over one year, and yet there is no concrete sign that the Federal Government intends to do anything to ward off the ugly situation of yet another avoidable strike.
“The Federal Government under President Muhammadu Buhari has pushed the Union, once more to the precipice of a Nation-wide and indefinite strike through its failure to honour the Memorandum of Action (MOA) reached with the Union in December 2020 upon which the union suspended conditionally its 9months strike”
Uduk decried bastardization of the university system by the current administration through the introduction of the (IPPIS), noting that about twenty-two (22) academic staff of the University of Uyo have not received their salaries since February 2020 because of the IPPIS platform.
She listed some highlights of the MOA including renegotiation, signing and implementation of the 2009 agreement between the union and the federal government, implementation of University Transparency and Accountability Solution, UTAS, to replace the corruption-prone, obnoxious IPPIS.
“The obnoxious payment platform for workers in Nigeria’s public universities is also not a new matter. The Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System, IPPIS, which the Federal Government has imposed on the Nigeria University system is about the worst tragedy the nation’s educational system has ever suffered.
“The platform has technically abrogated the universities autonomy and authority to hire and fire staff, which is a constitutional and statutory responsibility of University Governing Council”, Uduk stated.
Source: Vanguard
