The Association Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP) in a press release over the weekend announced that members will be engaging in a nationwide strike on November 13, this announcement comes after the end of 21 days of warning that was given to the Government that seemed to have fallen on deaf ears.
Comrade Usman Dutse who is serving as the president of the union made known the following reasons for the strike action:
The Government had failed to show any interest in their affairs as he claimed was clearly shown when the responsible Ministry did not show up for the conciliatory meeting to resolve their demands that was set up by the Federal Ministry of Labor in Abuja on October 24, 2017. The Federal Ministry of Education had sent as a representative, a Deputy Director without a clear mandate to address their needs and this they felt showed lack of concern.
The second reason for the imminent strike as addressed by the release is the failure to implement the NEEDS assessment suggestion that involves the injection a sum of N6.5 billion into the association account, which was agreed on in 2014 and which has risen to N8 billion. Comrade Usman accused some Government officials of siphoning funds for personal satisfaction.
Also included in the demands that the Ministry of Education had failed to meet is the payment of Personal Releases and they also pointed at shortfalls in Withdrawal of Allowances. Finally, he pointed out that the CONTISS 15 Migration that saw the increase in salary scale has not been in full working terms as only the ‘upper cadre’ have been cared for and lecturers in the ‘lower cadre’ have been ignored in the implementation of this plan.
The president of the union concluded the release by saying:
“In view of the above, our union rising from this emergency meeting hereby resolved to commence an indefinite and comprehensive strike action effective 13th November, 2017. This action shall be sustained until our demands are met or an implementable memorandum of action is agreed upon by our union and relevant agencies of government.”
The Government has early this month settled members of the ASUU and avoided resumption of the suspended strike and we look forward to them solving the issues that have been raised by ASUP.
