UNIOSUN appeals to workers to call off strike

The management of Osun State University has appealed to the striking workers of the institution to return to work as the governing council promised to pay their earned allowances within the next thirty months.

The was contained in a statement signed by the Registrar of the institution, Gafar Shittu, on Tuesday.

The statement read, “It is apposite to state at this juncture, that the University has been unable to pay the Earned Allowance because of the shortfall in its finances. Nevertheless, of the total sum of five hundred and twenty-four million naira (N524M) being the cost of the accrued allowances for the 2013/2014 and 2014/2015, the sum of two hundred and twenty-four million naira (N224M) has since been paid while the university is not owing any arrears of salary till date.

“It should be noted that even Federal Universities have only paid for 2009/2010 while no state university in Nigeria has paid anything close to UNIOSUN. Yet, non-teaching staff Unions have continued to reject offer of instalmental payment of the balance of the three hundred million (N300M) but preferred payment of the earned allowance at most twice without due cognizance of the peculiar financial status of the University.

“The non-teaching staff members have been on strike for three (3) weeks. The implication is that the University has been practically shut down. Several statutory meetings had to be cancelled or postponed while the National Universities Commission (NUC)’s accreditation of regular undergraduate programmes and the Nursing Council of Nigeria’s professional accreditation of the nursing programme were almost stalled.

“Meanwhile the non-teaching staff members who are still on strike were paid salaries while the students who are financing the University are losing out and being short-changed.”

It continued, stating the university management had directed that “the N300 million balance of the 2014/2015 Earned Allowance be paid by instalment ats of ten million (N10M) per month effective from 30th April 2018.”

The institution also maintains “no-work-no pay” extant rule remains in force except the university workers resume.

“All non-teaching staff on strike should resume back to work on or before the 10th April 2018, failing which the extant rules of the University will apply.”