19th November, 2020
By Taiwo Okanlawon
The Federal Government will on Friday resume meeting with the Academic Staff Union of Universities over the ongoing strike in the country’s public universities.
The meeting is expected to address various pending issues, including the contentious payment platform preferred by the union.
The Ministry of Labour and Employment spokesman, Charles Akpan, disclosed this to newsmen on Wednesday.
ASUU had opposed the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System, IPPIS used in settling workers’ salaries by the federal government and instead, developed the University Transparency and Accountability Solution which is currently undergoing test-run by the National Information Technology Development Agency.
The Senior Staff Association of Nigeria Universities and the Non-Academic Staff Union had also proposed the University General and Peculiar Personnel and Payroll System in place of the IPPIS.
However, the Ministry of Labour and Employment spokesman, disclosed that the dialogue with the ASUU leaders would hold at the ministry’s conference hall on Friday.
The government said it had agreed to pay N30bn Earned Academic Allowance, N20b for the revitalisation of the education sector and the arrears of salaries to the university teachers, adding that the only outstanding issue was the disagreement over the payment platform.
But ASUU insisted that the government has not met its demands, noting that the resolution of the eight-month strike was not in sight.
Meanwhile, the Federal government has said the private sector must be involved in financing universities in the country because the burden is too much for the government alone.