In a move to end the seven months closure of public varsities in the country, the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, yesterday, said the government could only afford a 23.5 percent salary increase for lecturers, while a 35 percent increment will be enjoyed by professors, as its last effort to break the industrial dispute between university teachers and the Federal Government.
This was a fallout of the meeting between the government, pro-chancellors, and vice chancellors of federal universities aimed at finding lasting solutions to the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) at the National Universities Commission (NUC) in Abuja.
The union has been on strike since February 14 over the revitalization of public universities, payment of earned academic allowances, and deployment of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) for payment of university lecturers’ salaries, among others. Amid the strike, the government had invoked the ‘No work, No pay’ policy.
The Minister, who noted that President Muhammadu Buhari warned against signing agreements that the government will not be able to meet, said the only issue yet to be resolved with ASUU is the position of the law on ‘No work, No pay.’
He said: “The Federal Government can only afford a 23.5 percent salary increase for all categories of the workforce in federal universities, except for the professorial cadre, which will enjoy a 35 percent upward review.
“Henceforth, allowances that pertain to ad-hoc duties of the academic and non-academic staff shall be paid as and when due by the Governing Councils of universities to which such services are rendered and to the staff who perform them.
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Source: Guardian