Vasity Lecturers’ Salaries Stagnant Since 2009, Says ASUU

ASUU Zonal Coordinator, Sokoto Zone, Prof Abubakar Sabo, flanked by other academics during the press conference. Photo: Ankeli Emmanuel
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From Ankeli Emmanuel, Sokoto

Zonal Coordinator, Sokoto Zone of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Prof. Abubakar Sabo, has disclosed that lecturers in Nigeria have been on same salary regime since 2009.

Prof. Sabo, who made the disclosure at a press conference held in Sokoto, NUJ Secretariat, also lamented that the highest paid professor in Nigeria’s public institutions earns a meagre $210 per month since the truncation of the 2009 agreement.

His words: “The most obvious implication of the truncation of the 2009 agreement is that university teachers in Nigeria have been on the same salary regime since 2009 when the value of Naira to a dollar was N120! Today, it is above N1,750 and rising.

“It is no longer news that the salary of the highest paid professor, on average, has been reduced to a meagre $210 per month.”

While stressing that after calling off the recent strike action, the Federal Government has paid only four out of their seven and half months withheld salaries till date, Prof Sabo wondered why the government was trying to push lecturers into another round of strike action to get their entitlements which is already captured in the budget made available to ASUU by Chief of Staff to the President, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila.

Expressing disappointment over the Federal Government’s failure to fulfil its obligation under the 2009 Renegotiated Agreement with ASUU, Prof. Sabo further listed other disputes to include withheld salary, refusal to pay backlog of arears of Earned Academic Allowance (EAA), underfunding of universities and illegal dissolution of university governing councils.

Continuing, the erudite scholar listed other issues at stake to include the non-actualization of the exit from IPPIS, reneging on reverting back to quarterly release of university funds, as well as the non-release of promotion arrears and payment of salaries to academics unjustly denied because of their opposition to the IPPIS imposition.

The Sokoto Zone of ASUU advised the National University Commisson (NUC) to focus its attentions on other pressing issues such as proliferation of universities, poor condition of service and mass exodus of academics rather than concentrating on the rejected Core Curriculum and Maximum Academic Standard (CCMAS) that seeks to erode the powers of the various universities.

Raising posers on how the National Assembly’s invitation of heads of tertiary institutions in the guise of “oversight” could possibly create a leeway to fritter away TETFUND intervention funds, ASUU submitted that “some of our vice chancellors could become susceptible to corruption and other sharp practices associated with such oversights”.

The ASUU Sokoto Zone consists of eight universities located in Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara states.

At the press conference with Prof. Sabo were Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto ASUU Chairman, Prof. Almustapha Nurudeen, Dr. Muhammad Auwal and Dr. Shaibu Sadiq, among others.


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