Efforts are ongoing between state governors and federal government to pay the salary of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, Governor Mohammed Badaru of Jigawa state has said.
Badaru, a governor of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC made this revelation during a meeting with the executive of the National Association of Nigerian Students, NANs in Abuja, the nation’s capital.
The university lecturers resumed last month from an eight-month-old strike following a deal brokered by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila.
But the decision by the federal government not to pay them for the period they were on strike, in line with its no-work-no-pay policy has threatened the truce reached by the two parties.
But hope may be on the horizon for the lecturers if the comment of the Jigawa governor is anything to go by.
Speaking to the university students leaders, the governors said the intervention is necessary in order to resolve the crisis once and for all, adding that the government will use legal means to end the problems in the nation’s ivory towers.
Meanwhile, Senator Ali Ndume has urged the federal government to cut the salaries and allowance of members of the National Assembly to raise funds to pay ASUU.
The Chairman Senate Committee on Army said there is an urgent need to find a lasting solution to the ASUU problem, adding that it was wrong not to pay the lecturers full salary because they embarked on strike.
According to him, “Even if it means that the National Assembly will reduce sitting allowances or be paid on casual allowances basis whenever they sit at the Lower and Upper chambers, by cutting the recurrent expenditure in the budget of the federal lawmakers to settle the ASUU arrears, let it be
“We only assemble twice or so in a week and get paid as such.”
“So why will the federal government cut university lecturers’ salaries because they went on legitimate strike? Constitutionally, they’re fighting for their rights and privileges.
“As a matter of priority and as a public servant in the legislative chambers, we do not work, so why don’t you just give us half salaries and then pay ASUU,” Ndume said.
