The Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) have embarked on a seven-day warning strike to protest the withholding of their salaries for four months.
The unions announced the warning strike on Monday in Abuja, following a meeting of their joint action committee held in Akure, Ondo State, last Thursday and Friday.
Mohammed Ibrahim, the SSANU National President, addressed journalists and explained that the strike became necessary as the Federal Government had failed to pay them the four months’ salary withheld due to their nationwide strike in 2022.
While the Federal Government recently released the withheld four months’ salary to the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), which was also on strike in 2022, SSANU and NASU were excluded from this payment.
In protest, SSANU and NASU sent protest letters to the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, and the Minister of Education, Tahir Mamman, on February 13, 2024, highlighting the exclusion of non-teaching staff from the payment of outstanding salaries.
The unions denounced the discriminatory practice and accused the government of violating the post-strike agreement regarding the non-victimization of their members.
They demanded immediate implementation of the President’s directive to pay all university-based unions four months’ salary. Failure to do so led to the approval of a one-week warning strike by the unions’ National Executive Council (NEC), in collaboration with their sister union in JAC, NASU.
Additionally, the unions urged the government to expedite action on renegotiating the new national minimum wage, citing the impact of hyperinflation on the current minimum wage’s value.
