“Our members left for two months without pay and without any explanation of such measures by the Taraba government and the university`s management,” he said. Garba prayed for God to touch the hearts of all the individuals and groups responsible for not solving these problems, in order to bring worldliness to the system. Today, we have NUPEMCO looking after our pensions. Another point is that in the future, the federal government should look inward for some of its development policies. If ASUU is able to develop UTAS in a few months, there is no point in contracting for the development of IPPIS. Using our local human and material resources on these and other related issues would be a long way to improving our capabilities. According to the president of the ASUU, the union has never refused an invitation to a negotiating meeting with the government. He said the union had asked government officials to send a response to the last letter the union had sent them. “How can they claim to have invited us to a meeting without a clear agenda or invitation letter?” He asked me.
In a speech on Tuesday after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari in Abuja`s presidential villa, Ngige said the integrity test was being carried out by the Nigerian Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA). In addition to opposition to IPPIS, the union also criticized the FG for not sticking to the agreements signed by the two sides a few years ago. The government accepts ASUU`s proposal on UTAS, with full implementation deadlines for the 18-month period. Prior to that, the federal government asked ASUU members to register for IPPIS in the interim prior to the full development of UTAS. And they must be migrated to the UTAS when they are fully developed. He pointed out that the federal government`s attempt to impose the enrolment of university professors in IPPIS for university professors was a conspiracy to distract the union from the ongoing renegotiation of the 2009 agreement. He said: “With quality and accessible university training, we can guarantee a supply of knowledge in scientists, doctors, nurses, laboratory technicians and other medical and paramedical personnel to deal with a global pandemic like COVID-19. But it seems that our universities have no place in the government`s current efforts.
According to Ngige, the government has proposed within six months what it will pay each month, while ASUU has made a counter-proposal. The government said it had agreed to pay N30 billion N30 billion in academic allocation earned, N20 billion for the recovery of the education sector and arrears to higher education teachers, adding that the only outstanding issue was disagreement on the payment platform. But ASUU insisted that the government did not respond to its demands and found that the solution to the eight-month strike was not in sight. The bitter truth is that the education and health sector is in total disarray, and we must (all) take a step in the right direction. For example, in developed countries Covid-19 immediately hit the level of the pandemic they went straight to research to see how they can come up with a cure. But what has Nigeria done? We don`t even have the facilities to test. This is one of the agendas of ASUU, which is investing more resources in education. Research is the key to any economic growth and come to mind when it, Nigerian universities have its system that is not even detected by IPPIS, you can create the image under IPPIS made that you have not registered their actual salaries and there is not even to enter their basic allowances specifically for universities, the question is what it would do to our government to implement all this and improve the sector education and health.
