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Withheld salaries: SSANU, NASU end warning strike, tell members what to do
Members of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) called off their seven-day warning strike on Sunday.
In a circular to branch chairmen at public institutions across the country, SSANU President Mohammed Ibrahim instructed SSANU and NASU members to return to work on Monday, March 25, 2024.
The two unions began a seven-day warning strike on Monday, March 18, 2024, over withholding salaries, with personnel in registry, bursary, works and maintenance, security, and student affairs withdrawing their services.
Our correspondents who visited public universities across the country observed that nothing moved administratively within any public university in Nigeria as hostels and varsity gates were locked up and electricity supply cut off.
Both SSANU and NASU are protesting withheld salaries by the Federal Government. The two unions berated the Federal Government for paying withheld salaries to the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) while neglecting the non-academic unions.
All the unions had embarked on an eight-month strike in 2022 to press home some of their demands including a better welfare package. The administration of then President Muhammadu Buhari subsequently invoked a ‘No Work, No Pay policy’ against the unions but President Bola Tinubu last October approved the release of four of the eight months withheld salaries.
SSANU and NASU accused the Federal Government of unfair treatement and discrimination by failing to pay them like their academic counterparts.
The unions, after an initial notice on March 11, 2024, made do their threat a week later, shutting down hostels, power supply, security and administrative works in universities across the country, a development that has been heavily criticised by the Labour Minister, Nkiruka Onyejeocha, who described the unions’ action as a total disregard for the Federal Government’s concerted effort to address their concerns.
