The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has stated that the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, was not forthright in his statement on the impasse between the Federal Government and the union.
The union said Ngige’s statement in an interview on national television on September 29 that the impasse was all about the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) and the University Transparency Accountability Solution (UTAS) was half-truth and misleading.
Professor Fred Esumeh, the Benin Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, in a statement issued in Benin City, alleged that Ngige had, during the said television interview, claimed that government had at his insistence been paying salaries of the unionists up to date despite the IPPIS crisis, the coronavirus disease (COVID-19)-induced lockdown and the strike.
Esemeh urged the public to disregard the comments, describing them as essential part of the minister’s grandstanding and deliberate ploy to misinform and deceive the public on the critical issues that informed the current strike by the union.
“It is far from the truth to say that our members have been paid up to date. Consequent upon government’s insistence on implementation of IPPIS and its accompanying complications, our members are being owed three months’ salaries, while in some universities our members have not received salaries for six months.”Esumeh stressed that until government addressed the issue at stake in a comprehensive fashion, ASUU would continue with the strike.
