Negotiate for your members, ASUU tells SSANU, other unions

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) says there are plots by the federal government to pit the union against the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian University (SSANU) and other tertiary institution-based unions.

SSANU had on Tuesday warned Prof. Nimi-Briggs-led Committee renegotiating the 2009 Agreement with ASUU that it would not accept any disparity in salaries of university staff.

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The union vowed to take legal action against such development.

But reacting to SSANU’s stand, the President of ASUU, Prof. Emmanuel Osodeke, advised other unions in the universities to negotiate for their members rather than fall for divisions.

Osodeke, in an exclusive interview with Daily Trust, said his union would not be a party to divisions but would remain resolute in its dealings.

‘’We don’t talk about them (SSANU and others) as a union. They should go and negotiate for their members because they are different unions. What the government is trying to do is just to create divisions between us.

‘’If that is what they want, we don’t want to be part of it. They should go and negotiate for their members; that’s all! The two unions don’t negotiate the same thing,’’ he said.

President of SSANU, Mohammed Ibrahim, had warned that the proposed salary disparity by the Nimi-Briggs Committee for the university staff would cause fresh problems in the university systems.

“We have read in the media that there is a proposal for the review of salary for university staff with a differential of teaching staff taking between 108 to 180 per cent and unreasonable of 10 per cent for non-teaching staff,’’ Ibrahim had said.