NASU threatens to resume strike over earned allowance

The Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions (NASU) yesterday threatened to resume its suspended strike if the Federal Government fails to bridge the gap in the payment of earned allowances in the nation’s universities.
This is even as it called for the upward review of salaries of workers as the inflation has continued to make workers earning inadequate for their sustenance.
President of NASU, Dr. Makolo Hassan, speaking at the opening ceremony of the union’s National Executive Council (NEC) meeting on Tuesday in Abuja said close to five years, the Non-Teaching Staff Unions in the Universities and Inter-University Centres have fought relentlessly over the disproportionate sharing formula of 80/20% and 75/25% to the Academic and Non-Teaching Staff in the Universities.
“The core of equity theory says that individuals judge the fairness of their treatment based on how others like them are treated. It is hard for an employee to feel motivated in the workplace if he or she feels that he or she is being treated unfairly,” he said.
He noted that the unending crisis associated with the unjustified sharing formula of the Earned Allowance in the Universities and Inter-University Centres calls to question the sincerity of this government toward the fight against corruption.
According to him, government officials have not hidden their bias towards Academic staff against the Non-Teaching staff of Universities and Inter-University Centres in the payment of Earned Allowances. 
He said, “The sharing of the previous releases for the Earned Allowance will give you an idea of what is going on.
2nd Tranche of Earned Allowance – Year 2017- N23b was released at the rate of 89% to ASUU and 11% to Non-Teaching Staff. Supplementary of N8b was later released to Non-Teaching Staff.
3rd Tranche of Earned Allowance – Year 2019 – N25b was released at the rate of 80% to ASUU and 20% to Non-Teaching Staff.
4th Tranche of Earned Allowance – Year 2021 – N40b was released at the rate of  75% to ASUU and 25% to Non-Teaching Staff.”
Hassan expressed that the Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, who is the Conciliator-in-Chief of the Federation, and who the Non-Teaching Staff Unions in the sector approached for mediation, further compounded the problem as he told the union to take their grievance to the Federal Ministry of Education and the National Universities Commission (NUC). “All these leaves no one in doubt that the Federal Government is emotionally motivating Non-Teaching members of staff to take unintended actions that will assist them to gain equity on the matter,” he said. 
The NASU boss said the union was  aware of plans to share the next round of the Earned Allowance in the same manner it was done previously, adding that to continue to ignore the feelings of Non-Teaching staff in these acts of unfair treatment, will not make the feeling to go away; but rather, such attitude will continue to provoke industrial crisis in the system.
“We are therefore using this medium to call on the President to intervene and stop the continuous sowing of seed of inequity and distrust in the system by officials of his Government. 
“We are making it clear, that if the Federal Government decides as usual to ignore this appeal, then Government would have forced us into resuming our suspended strike on this matter,” he stated. 
In the same vein, NASU lamented that the consistent devaluation of the Naira against other currencies including the high inflation rates has caused the prices of goods and services to increase, thereby causing a drastic fall in real wages. 
The NASU President said President Muhammad Buhari in his Independence Day Address admitted that there is an increase in the prices of food items, even though he blamed it on middlemen whom he accused of wanting to make excessive profits. 
He reasoned that this may have necessitated the increase in the feeding budgets of the families of the President and the Vice President in the 2022 budget, the highest since 2015 when they came to power, noting that similar thing may have applied in the States.
“This state of affairs has brought poverty to the door steps of workers. In order to save workers from abject poverty, hunger and destitution, we are calling on the Federal and State Governments to review upward, salaries of workers,” he stated.