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Govt owes public varsities N660b, says ASUU

By Iyabo Lawal Ibadan
12 January 2016   |   1:22 am
THE Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) cried out yesterday that the Federal Government owes public universities close to N660 billion of the National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) Assessment Intervention Fund.

Prof.-Segun-Ajiboye

THE Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) cried out yesterday that the Federal Government owes public universities close to N660 billion of the National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) Assessment Intervention Fund.

The Zonal Coordinator of Ibadan Zone of ASUU and Chairman University of Ibadan Chapter of the Union, Professor Segun Ajiboye, who disclosed this while speaking with reporters in Ibadan said the money was part of the unpaid intervention fund for the last three years.

Specifically, Ajiboye said for year 2014, government owed N220billion; 2015- N220billion and 2016 -N220billion, which was part of the N1.3trillion intervention FGN/ASUU agreement signed in 2013.

The ASUU chief added that the government owes academic staff in the public universities more than N200 billion arrears of earned allowances for the 2014 and 2015 academic years.

He reminded the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government that the 2009 agreement, which was due for a review in 2012, has not been addressed by the Federal Government, maintaining that several efforts by the union on the need to start the renegotiation of the agreement to reflect modern and contemporary realities have not yielded any result.

“When you consider the agreed intervention fund in 2013, it was N1.3trillion but has the Federal Government kept to that promise? They only released N200billion in 2013 after the six months strike and since then nothing has been injected. Unfortunately, it is the same government agents that will be saying Nigerian universities are lowly ranked globally without doing the needful to make the universities meet global standards. This involves injecting enough funds into the tertiary education system. If the funds are released, our universities will be able to compete when the necessary infrastructure is in place,” Ajiboye explained.

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