ASUU Orders Members to Suspend Work Over Salary Delays

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has directed its members to suspend work whenever their salaries are delayed. 

Professor Christopher Piwuna, the ASUU President, announced this on Monday in an interview with the Nigerian Tribune.  He maintained that whenever salaries are unpaid till the third of a new month, ASUU members should stop working until they are paid. Piwuna summarised this as the ‘no pay, no work rule.’

In addition, he said that members cannot continue to work without access to food or the means to transport themselves to work. Piwuna added that the rule resulted from the Federal Government’s decision to frustrate the Government’s Integrated Financial Management Information System (GIFMIS), which replaced the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS).

“Now, we do not receive our salaries as and when due again, and our best explanation for this sudden development is that the government is punishing us just because we were out of the IPPIS platform. And more so, the government has not come out to tell us why our salaries are constantly being delayed. So, the position of the union now, which the NEC has already resolved, is that if our salaries are not paid on the third day of a new month, we will not work until we are paid. Furthermore, we have communicated this to all our branches,” Piwuna stated

This decision is closely related to the actions of some universities that went on strike last year. The Taraba State University chapter of the ASUU declared an indefinite strike, halting academic activities and the ongoing second-semester examinations.  In the same vein, the Kaduna State University Branch of ASUU declared an indefinite strike over unresolved welfare concerns.