Fresh face-off between FG and ASUU as body rejects IPPIS for lecturers
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has tackled the federal government as fresh row emerged over the adoption of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Service (IPPIS).
President Muhammadu Buhari had on Thursday, October 9, stated that lecturers and other federal government workers who are not captured under the controversial system would not receive their salaries.
The president stated this while presenting the 2021 budget to the two tiers of the National Assembly, stressing that no going back on the adoption of IPPIS which he said would help in tackling fraud and excess in government.
But on Monday, October 12, ASUU said Buhari’s statement is just a figment of the federal government’s imagination, vowing that there will not be work in the federal schools unless the system is grounded.
Speaking at a closed-door meeting with the leadership of the Senate, ASUU national leader Prof Biodun Ogunyemi stated that members of the body would not accept to be dictated to on how they should be paid.
Ogunyemi said ASUU has developed its home-grown system called University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS).
According to him, this will serve as an alternative to the controversial IPPIS developed by the federal government which he said is foreign to the Nigerian system.
Ogunyemi also declared that universities will not be reopened despite the directives to lift the ban on classes and learning centres.
In his words:
“UTAS is home-grown while IPPIS is foreign. We are talking about local content. We have shown that we are inventors, we are creators of software and we are also capable of doing what our colleagues are doing in other parts of the world.
“So, Nigerian scholars are not inferior. Why should we be patronising foreigners for what we can do in Nigeria?”
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