By Matthew Tabe
After the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, denied knowledge of signing an agreement with the leadership of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) regarding payment of salary arrears to the lecturers, the union’s president, Professor Emmanuel Osodeke, is not responding to questions pertaining to the existence of a written commitment by the Speaker that the Federal Government will pay up what was owed.
It would be recalled that Prof. Osodeke, during an earlier interview with Tribune, said that the Speaker had signed a document with ASUU to have its members receive the eight months’ salaries when they were on strike.
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To confirm the veracity of the claim, QUEST TIMES made several calls and text messages to the ASUU President for the proof of documents signed by the Speaker of the House Representatives.
The ASUU President apparently avoided responding to QUEST TIMES’ inquiry.
All the calls put to his phone for hours by our correspondents received the responses, “I’m busy”, “I’m in a ceremony”.
After each call, our correspondents sent him WhatsApp messages. But he did not address the issue.
The text message our reporter sent to his WhatsApp was “Good Afternoon Sir, I work with Quest Times. There’s a report on social media where the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt Hon Femi Gbajabiamila has denied committing himself to offsetting the arrears of salaries owed members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) by the Federal Government.
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“So is there any written agreement to this Sir?”
As of the time of filing this report, the union has not made public the details of the allegedly signed documents between both parties.
According to Osodeke “Gbajabiamila even presented a paper signed by him to ASUU leadership indicating the seriousness of the government to pay in full the eight-month salaries its members were owed and also urgently attend to some other matters and specified how to address them.”
QUEST TIMES wanted the Union to produce the “signed document” to counter the claims made by the Speaker.
The National Assembly has debunked that any document was signed with the ASUU leaders over the industrial strike. In particular, the Speaker has denied committing himself to offsetting the arrears of salaries owed ASUU members by the Federal Government.
He made the disclosure in a statement issued in Abuja on Wednesday, December 28, 2022, by the Chairman House of Representatives Committee on Information, Mr Benjamin Kalu.
According to Kalu, the Speaker never made such a commitment. He however said that the House had resolved to improve the welfare package of university lecturers and provide more money for universities revitalisation fund.
According to him, these commitments have been reflected in the 2023 Appropriation Bill, which include N170 billion to raise the welfare package of university lecturers and an additional N300 billion revitalisation fund.
Kalu also said that the House has been working with key stakeholders to facilitate the adoption of elements of ASUU’s University Transparency and Accountability Solution into the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System.
“This effort is being supervised by the Chairman of the House Committee on Tertiary Education, Rep. Aminu Suleiman,” he added.
Kalu said, “The public interest in ensuring a well-functioning tertiary education sector is a matter of paramount concern for all who understand the transformational role of education in any society.
He therefore urged the ASUU President to work with all stakeholders for the common good of all.