The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Benin Zone, has rejected the salary increment proposed by the Federal Government, describing it as grossly inadequate and incapable of addressing the deep-rooted challenges confronting the nation’s university system.
The Zonal Coordinator of ASUU, Prof. Monday Lewis Igbafen, stated this in Benin during a press briefing on the union’s position regarding the ongoing negotiations with the government.
Igbafen said the proposed salary adjustment amounted to “a mere drop in the ocean” and fell far short of what was required to halt the persistent brain drain affecting Nigerian universities. He expressed disappointment that the government had once again shown “a blatant unwillingness” to holistically address longstanding issues.
“The Federal Government must be serious, for once, about putting these unresolved issues behind us by satisfactorily concluding the renegotiation of the 2009 FGN/ASUU agreement and genuinely addressing all other outstanding matters,” he said.
According to him, the salary and conditions of service remain critical concerns requiring urgent and radical intervention to avert an impending breakdown in the system.
“We have rejected the proposed salary increment because it is incapable of reversing the brain drain syndrome currently bedevilling university education in the country. Enough is enough of the back-and-forth approach to this negotiation. This repeated ‘we are talking with ASUU’ without tangible results must stop,” he added.
Igbafen further lamented that university lecturers have been on the same salary structure since 2009, when the exchange rate was N120 to the US dollar. He noted that, despite significant economic shifts, salaries in other sectors had been reviewed upward multiple times, while those of university academics had remained stagnant.
He warned that the continued delay in conclusively renegotiating the 2009 agreement was worsening the conditions of service for academics and undermining the quality and stability of university education across the country.
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