We shall disrupt varsity’s system if FG fails to sign the agreement - SSANU President

The Federal Government and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) had engaged in a tripartite negotiation for the past two and half years on the issues of salary of its members, retirement age, and recently arrived at an agreement which the Minister of Education,Dr. Sam Egwu said had been accepted by President Yar’Adua. Soji-Eze Fagbemi, was at a media briefing addressed by the SSANU President, Comrade Promise Adewusi on the issue. Excerps: :

SSANU has been involved in tripartite negotiations with the Federal Government over the years but is it now resolved, what is the issue in contention?
Everything here is in the stage of fluid and also exigency. You are aware of the re-negotiating in our 2001 agreement that began two years ago and through the intervention of some stakeholders, government unwillingly brought the process of re-negotiation to an end. But since then the agreement had not been implemented, even though, the Minister of Education told Nigerians recently that government had worked out a new salary plan for university workers.

In line with that, all the unions in the university were called to come and sign the document we negotiated for, but to our greatest surprise when we got there, new element were introduced. For instance, we learnt that government set up a technical committee to review the product of this collective bargaining and you all know that in the spirit of collective bargaining once an agreement is reached, it becomes binding on all the parties concerned and does not require any further consideration by any other higher authority.

But are both sides very satisfied with the content of the agreement, especially the labour side?
Not that we are totally satisfied with the product of this agreement but in the spirit of give and take we accepted  it,  so as to ensure peace in the education system, and I must tell you that we, on our part, have maintained industrial peace in the university  system, because  SSANU, apart from the warning strike of last year which we embarked upon,  we have not gone on strike for seven years now due to our belief that the issues can be talked over. But it seems that government is taking us for granted because we also believe in dialogue and due process.

For instance, one of the key elements of the agreement is the revalidation of the previous agreement we had with government which stated that our members should retire at the age of 65 so that we can fully make use of the benefit of their experience over time and the money expended on them in terms of training to bear fruit for the system, but the reverse is the case. The government had since extended this 65 years of retirement to polytechnic teachers and those of colleges of education but for SSANU it said it must go through legislative process so that everybody will retire, thereby denying our members the fruit of this negotiated agreement they started a long time ago.

Few days ago Federal Government invited us to sign the document for our demand, but to our greatest surprise on getting there to sign the agreement, we were told about this technical committee set up by government  which  introduced new element and which we believe rendered  that agreement invalidated.

How long have you been on this negotiation?
The issue of SSANU’s demand has recorded one of the longest negotiations ever in Nigeria because, it has to wait for two and half years to arrive at an agreement, and the government side is still prevaricating and has not gotten the required authority to effectively sign this document. So, as far as SSANU is concerned, this is totally unacceptable and it makes us suspicious of the government we should otherwise trust. However, if, after that period government does not take any step and perfect this agreement through appropriate signing, SSANU would declare a trade dispute.