University workers’ union confirms government’s efforts to pay members

The Congress of Nigerian University Academics (CONUA) has confirmed the move by the Nigerian government to pay the withheld salaries of its members.

The Nigerian government has confirmed that it will implement the No Work, No Pay policy on public university workers who are out of work during a prolonged labor strike in 2022.

The strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) lasted eight months while other unions including the Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Other Associated Institutions (NASU), Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the National Association of Academic Technologists. (NAAT) also lasts a month.

But CONUA, a newly registered faction of ASUU, continues to insist that it is not a strike party by a rival union, and that it can only continue teaching because the university is closed by management.

Both ASUU and CONUA are academic unions in Nigerian universities.

Hope for relief

However, following the November 2022 letter to the government regarding the payment of salaries of CONUA members withheld, the government has responded to CONUA asking for details of members to pay their salaries, the National Coordinator of CONUA, ‘Niyi Sunmonu, told our reporter. on Monday.

He said the union was following the process, but the payment had not been made.

But Mr. Sunmonu, a lecturer at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), did not give journalists the amount of CONUA membership that the government should pay, saying “at the right time, the people will know.”

“I can confirm that CONUA received a letter requesting to send a list of members,” he said in reply to our reporter. “The payment has not been made. It is a process and we are walking through it,” he said.

CONUA has always insisted, since the beginning of the eight-month strike by ASUU, that its members are not parties to the strike.

Consequently when the Nigerian government officially recognized CONUA in October 2022, it appealed to the Minister of Labor and Employment, Chris Ngige, to facilitate the payment of salaries of CONUA members, saying the No Work, No Pay policy is not affected.

At the meeting, Mr. Ngige told CONUA to write to the government, stating that if the lecturers work during the strike, they will be paid.

---

CONUA, therefore, wrote to the government in November and in December when the government failed to respond to CONUA, the union threatened to take legal measures.

Spokespersons for the Ministry of Education, and Labor and Employment, Ben Goong, and Olajide Oshundun, said the ministry was not aware of CONUA’s payment plan.

Qosim Suleiman is a reporter at Premium Times in partnership with Report for the World, which matches local newsrooms with talented new journalists to report on issues that are not being covered around the world.