IPPIS defrauding us, SSANU, NASU members cry out

Members of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) have again opposed the function of the salary payment platform, Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information (IPPIS).

The varsity workers, at a press briefing in Abuja, said majority of them had enrolled on the platform in the interest of the nation considering pervasive personnel and payroll indiscretions and infractions observed in the Nigerian University system.

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Addressing newsmen on behalf of the Joint Action Committee of the two unions, SSANU President, Mohammed Haruna Ibrahim, said they were demanding a total stoppage of the IPPIS after “unpalatable experience” and revert to the old payment platform under GIFMIS pending when their developed payment platform would be ready.

It would be recalled that the two unions had notified the federal government through Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, of its own platform called University General Peculiar Payroll Payment System (UGPPPS) while maintaining that it would not accept the one developed by ASUU called University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS).

Ibrahim explained, “From January this year, so many anomalies have been witnessed in salaries of our members, from underpayment to overpayment and multiple payment among others.

“Series of letters had been written to the relevant government offices, expressing our displeasure and seeking correction of these anomalies which had never been witnessed in the university system prior to the introduction of IPPIS.

“After a few months and observing that the trend of anomalies continued unabated, we were left with no choice but to demand a total stoppage of the IPPIS and a revert to the old payment platform under GIFMIS, or the adoption of a payment platform that will serve the same anti-corruption purposes as IPPIS while taking care of the peculiarities of salary payment in the university system and that was how the University General Peculiar Payroll Payment System (UGPPPS) was conceived.”

The union leader vowed that they would resist any payment platform not designed by them, saying the challenge being expressed from IPPIS would add more confusion to the “already existing anarchy”.

“SSANU shall no longer sit by and allow Government to continue to mistreat its members in a bid to satisfy other interests in the University system,” Ibrahim added.