Withheld salaries: SSANU, NASU holds protest in Lokoja varsity
Members of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities SSANU and Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities (NASU), Federal University Lokoja (FUL), on Tuesday, staged a protest in demand for withheld four months salaries.
The protest staged by the two unions at FUL’d Felele New Campus, was in solidarity with the Tuesday’s strike action declared by their national bodies, SSANU and NASU.
The aggrieved workers, who filed out the streets of the campus in the morning, carried placards of several inscriptions as they marched around the university campus.
They called on the Federal Government to release their withheld salaries and implement their other outstanding demands.
Some of the inscriptions including:- “FG not fair to SSANU ,NASU,” “FG pay our 4 Months Arrears now, we are not slaves” and ” FG give us that which belongs to us,” among others.
The Chairman, SSANU FUL chapter, Adedeji Suarau, in his remarks, called on the government to hasten the implementation of their demands to avoid a total breakdown of university education.
Suarau said, “All the University unions went on strike in 2022, and because of that the then president Muhammadu Buhari invoked ” No-work-No-pay” .
“When President Bola Tinubu came on board, he pardoned and gave approval that the withheld salaries be paid, but to our dismay, only our Sister union “ASUU” were paid while we the non-teaching staff were left out.
“On enquiry, we were told an approval is still being expected, which informed our decision to embark on this protest to show our displeasure over the ill-treatment.
“More still, even our promotion arrears have been lingering since 2018. Although some of your members were paid, others are left out till today.
“The Nigerian economy is biting hard on our members as even the wage awards to cushion the effect of removal of Oil subsidy is not being paid running to four months now.”
Saurau urged the federal government to pay all their monies including Earn allowance.
“If the government refuses to listen to our demands, we are going to shut down the country with strike action.”
Also speaking, the NASU Chairman of FUL, AbdulAzeez Yusuf said, the union had no option than to protest saying they have exhausted all their patience hence, the need for the protest.
Yusuf advised the government to wake up and do the needful otherwise they could not guarantee further industrial harmony.
