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UI governing council, union disagree over suspension of strike

By Muyiwa Adeyemi (Head South West Bureau Ibadan)
04 January 2018   |   4:21 am
The governing council of the University of Ibadan (UI) has called on the striking non-teaching staff of the institution to call off their strike and resume work immediately.

University of Ibadan

The governing council of the University of Ibadan (UI) has called on the striking non-teaching staff of the institution to call off their strike and resume work immediately.

The non-teaching staff of the university had on November 27, this year embarked on a strike over the alleged lopsided sharing formula in the N1.6b Earned Academic Allowances released by the Federal Government.

Out of the amount, the Federal Government ordered that the University of Ibadan Academic Staff should get N1.6billion while non-teaching staffers were allocated N105million, which they rejected.

But the governing council of the university that met on Monday resolved that the workers should resume duty “while negotiation continues between the leaders of the Joint Action Congress (JAC) and the Federal Government”.

The council also approved the payment, “of the verified earned academic allowances released by the Federal Government should be paid to the benefitting members of staff”.

While warning the unions to desist from harassing any members of staff, the council however resolved that, “appropriate sanctions be applied on staff who infringe on the extant guidelines and rules of the university in respect of harassment of people and locking of gates during protests and strikes”.

The Vice Chancellor of the University Prof Idowu Olayinka who confirmed the council resolution to The Guardian said: “The council considered it inappropriate to tamper with the sharing formula as labelled by the Federal Government but at the same time we recognize the fact that the leadership of JAC can continue to negotiate with the Federal Government but that should not disturb us from doing our work.

“The council met with the leadership of the unions on campus separately and jointly before coming up with the resolution.”

But the chairman of the Non Academic Staff of the University (NASU) UI branch, Olusegun Arojo told The Guardian that the council decision was not in tandem with the position of the national body of union which ordered them to embark on full industrial action.

He said the union had been magnanimous in the UI to have allowed for some skeletal services but the union may not have choice but to embark on a full scale industrial action because the “council was not fair to us”.

He said the union disagreed with the de ion of the council that the allowances be paid while the dispute on the matter is yet to be resolved.

He said, “Look at the composition of the council, apart from the Registrar and one or two members, others are members of academic staff union, so we are not happy with their decision to share the allowance with that formula. We cannot resume work now”.

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