Withheld Salaries: SSANU, NASU Set Meeting Date, Discern Next Plan of Action 

The Joint Action Committee of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities and Non-Academic Staff of Educational and Associated Institutions will meet on February 9, 2023, to discuss the government’s failure to respond to its demands, Team PLATO reliably gathered.


Mr Ibrahim Mohammed, President of the SSANU, lamented that following the JAC strike last year, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed with government representatives on about eight issues, but that none of those issues had been implemented to date.


Similarly, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, told the media that the government had not resolved all of the issues that prompted the union to go on strike for eight months in 2022.

Osodeke, who also said ASUU National Executive Council would meet soon revealed that “All the issues for which we went on strike have not been addressed but they are using the salary arrears to deviate from the main issue.

“Pay rise, Over four years of earned academic allowance has not been paid. We have given the Nigerian government ample opportunity to act, but nothing has been done. We’ll decide what to do if we get together.”

Mohammed stated that JAC would direct each union on what to do following the February 9 meeting.

“The JAC will meet on February 9 in Abuja to review the entire situation so that we know exactly where we are,” he said. JAC will now direct what each union should do.

Our four months’ salaries between May and August 2023 were withheld; the MoU signed has not seen the light of the day. Renegotiation of Earned Allowances was not concluded.”

SSANU vice president, Abdussobor Salaam, said the union’s expectation in 2023 was for the government to prevent another round of industrial actions from the Joint Action Committee of SSANU and NASU.

“Following our strike last year, a Memorandum of Understanding was reached with government representatives on about eight issues. To date, none of those issues has been actualised even though there was a two-month time-line for implementation. “To further compound matters, using its overreaching powers, the government stopped the salaries of our members for four months despite its culpability for allowing the strike to proceed because of its non-implementation of previous Collective Bargaining Agreements.”

TEAM PLATO REPORTS