JUPTI Suspends Strike, Threatens Stringent Measures Over Non Compliance By Finance Ministry
The Oasis Reporters
June 18, 2019
By Moses Gbande, Jos
The Joint Unions of Plateau State owned Tertiary Institutions, JUPTI has called off it’s seven weeks old strike embarked upon to press home their demands.
The unions representing College of Education, Gindiri, CAST Kurgwi, College of Agriculture Garkawa, Colleges of Health Technology Pankshin and Zawan on April 23rd 2019 collectívely declared an indefinite strike following the inability of the State government to honour it’s words and meet the demands of the Unions.
Briefing Journalists on Monday at the NUJ Press center in Jos, the spokesperson of the JUPTI, Comrade Paul Dakogol said the issues in contention were non Payment of the Outstanding Salary Arrears (NO Work No Pay) to Retirees and Deceased members:
“While this Government made concerted efforts and paid the salary “no work no pay’ ‘to our members in the service, the families of our deceased colleagues and those who subsequently retired were yet to be paid. This negligence on the part of government became an issue of concern.
“The deductible monies of our members by the government through its e-Payment platforms due to our multipurpose cooperatives and gratuity accounts were withheld without justifiable reasons. These were for the months of February and March, 2019.
“The implementation of Treasury Single Account (TSA): As an irreversible policy of, the government, the implementation of TSA via the withholding of 25 percent of students school fees without due consideration to fixed charges on overhead of the tertiary institutions by the ministry of finance resulted In the inefficient running of the institutions.
“While the yearly budget provisions of the government particularly on education repeatedly made provisions for subvention to meet the capital expenditure of these institutions, there have been no actual releases. For a long time now, some of these institutions have relied solely on TETFUND. Hence, the Unions demanded that the government can save the ailing infrastructural conditions of these institutions through special interventions or the actual release of such subventions.
“For a substantial lifespan of these institutions, staffing has remained a grave concern. Since 2006 when the last general recruitment were done, both teaching and non-teaching staff strength has continued to fizzle. This is even more worrisome as the basic requirements for new programs and the accreditation of same are predicated upon sufficient human resources among others.
He however stated that the suspension of the strike became imperative in view of the fact that the state Government has been able to address some of the issues, during the strike and last week entered into agreement with Union on those issues they could not handle immediately.
“The issues already addressed while on strike include the payment despite the ‘No Work No Pay’ policy, the unpaid check off dues and Cooperative deductions, gratuity remittance for the months of February and March, 2019 and staff recruitment which process is on-going.
“Other issues addressed via agreement include TSA implementation, Capital funds releases, peculiar allowances, etc.
“In the agreement, the government has approved the exemption of all the tertiary institutions from TSA, capital funding to be done in line with budgetary provision, the Ministry of Finance to Iiaise with various institutions to design modalities for the release of withheld 25% of IGR following the implementation of TSA then.
“Also, Government to look into the payment of peculiar allowances to academic and non-academic staff upon the submission of financial implications as well as hasten the approval of memo on the payment of 24 months pension arrears now before the Governor. The agreements were reached on 14″‘ June, 2019.
“Following these appreciable developments in the negotiation, the Unions after thorough consultations with its members thereby call for the suspension of the 7 weeks strike with immediate effect on this Day of 17th June, 2019”.
