The Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU) and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities have expressed displeasure over the inauguration of a re-negotiation committee by the Federal Government.
The Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, inaugurated the committee on Tuesday to re-negotiate the contentious 2009 agreement with university based unions.
The Joint Action Committee (JAC) of both unions said in a statement jointly signed by the General Secretary of NASU, Mr. Peters Adeyemi and SSANU President, Mr. Mohammed Ibrahim, on Wednesday in Abuja that the unions were not given due recognition.
The statement read: “Firstly, the reference on the letters of invitation to NASU and SSANU indicated ASUU, implying that the letters originated from ASUU’s file rather than from the files of our two Unions.
“The event appeared to have been primarily focused on ASUU with the other unions seemingly included as an afterthought.
“The minister of education’s inauguration speech centered almost entirely on ASUU, with only brief and cursory mentions of the other unions.”
It said the preferential treatment given to the ASUU leadership at the inauguration was unfair to the other unions.
“To confirm our fears, at the venue of the inauguration, the two unions witnessed a most humiliating experience.
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“The President of ASUU was placed on what was referred to as the ‘responsibility table’ and the presidents of other unions looked on from their positions of ‘irresponsibility’ from the proceeding.
“The ASUU President alone was invited to give a response on behalf of other unions without consultation.
“He ended up speaking on behalf of his union, this clearly showed that the opinions and experiences of other Unions do not matter in the re-negotiation.
“The proceedings of the entire inauguration have clearly shown the imbalance of relationship and the obvious unfair treatment that would be meted out to NASU and SSANU if the renegotiation process continues in this manner.
“Consequently, the JAC of NASU and SSANU hereby condemns the entire inauguration process.
“It signals a potential bias in favour of academic staff in the upcoming negotiations, to the detriment of non-teaching staff,” it added.
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