The Congress of University Academics (CONUA) has urgently called on the Federal Government to address unpaid salaries, promotion arrears, and other entitlements due to its members.
This appeal was made public through a communiqué issued after CONUA’s Second National Executive Council meeting held in Benin City yesterday.
The President of CONUA, Dr Niyi Sunmonu, expressed concern over the non-payment of three and a half months’ salaries that were withheld during the period of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike.
NATURENEX recalled that ASUU’s strike from February 2022, which lasted approximately eight months, led to the government enforcing a ‘no work, no pay’ policy, resulting in a withholding of seven and a half months’ salary for all academic staff.
While the National Industrial Court upheld this decision in 2023, President Bola Tinubu later authorized the payment of four months’ salaries as part of a resolution dialogue.
However, CONUA, having not participated in the strike, asserts that its members unjustly suffered from these deductions and demanded rectification.
The resolution said: “The continued withholding of the three and a half months salary of our members is rather unfair because we believed in industrial action as the best tool to enforce wishes and welfare. What the government did was to lump those who embarked on strike with those who did not! This is unjust, and is tantamount to punishing the innocent with the guilty.
“Through its unwarranted punishment of CONUA members, the government is inadvertently promoting the use of strikes as means of pursuing workers’ demands.
“CONUA-NEC, therefore, notes with apprehension that failure to process and pay these outstanding salaries could throw the universities into serious crises and jeopardize the peace currently being enjoyed.”
CONUA also demanded the release of third-party deductions for March, April, May, and June 2022 salaries, which it said, were withheld due to the strike action.
“We demand that the agencies of government involved be directed immediately to release these third-party remittances without further delay,” said the communique
The union called for the payment of promotion arrears spanning up to seven years in some cases, particularly in many state universities.
“This dispiriting state of affairs should be addressed expeditiously to enhance the diligence of the many academics affected by the counter-productive delay in the payment of promotion arrears,” it said.
