FG’s plan might result in a pay cut for lecturers

According to Sunday PUNCH investigations, the Federal Government’s offer to professors working under the auspices of the Academic Staff Union of Universities may result in a decrease in the pay for graduate assistant cadre entry-level teachers.

Additionally, according to information obtained by our correspondent, the bulk of ASUU members who participated in the zonal congresses rejected the Federal Government’s offer.

The union leaders met with the Emeritus Professor Nimi-Briggs committee last Tuesday, according to prior reports.

The president of ASUU, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, refused to reveal specifics of the conversation with the government but yet referred to the plan as a “miserable offer.”

The government’s refusal to release funds for university revitalization, the withholding of earned allowances from lecturers, the proliferation of universities founded by politicians and state governments, the refusal to implement the University Transparency Accountability System for the payment of lecturers’ salaries and allowances, and the government’s refusal to renegotiate the ASUU-FGN 2009 agreement were among the reasons given by the union for its current strike.

The government established a panel under the direction of Emeritus Prof. Nimi-Briggs, the pro-chancellor of the Federal University Lokoja, to lead its negotiation team with ASUU in an effort to end the strike and other contentious matters.

Last Thursday, Adamu Adamu, the minister of education, told a State House reporter that the government’s refusal to agree to pay the professors’ six-month salary arrears was delaying the end of the strike.

Adamu claims that ASUU requested that its members receive pay for the time they were on strike.

But according to union insiders who spoke with our correspondent in confidence and had access to the meetings, ASUU declined to continue the negotiations because of “a Greek gift.”

One of the sources revealed to one of our journalists on Saturday that graduate assistants’ take-home pay will be decreased while professors’ wages would see a “meagre” increase.

“For graduate assistants, the government proposed N1m per annum for starters, while senior graduate assistants will get N1.2m per annum, and by the time the necessary deductions will be made in terms of pension, tax, and other expenses, some of them may be going home with less than N90,000 monthly,” the source explained.