By Gabriel Dike
Federal university management have received via the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) their shares of the contentious Earned Allowance for payment to academic and non-teaching staff.
University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN), Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria and University of Calabar (UNICAL) received the lion share of the N40billion released.
The congress of Senior Staff Association of Nigeria Universities (SSANU) University of Lagos branch rejected the headship of the earned allowance sharing committee headed by an academic staff.
The Federal Government last week disclosed that the approved N40billion earned allowance for staff of federal universities have been made available for payment.
The receipt of the share of the earned allowance is generating internal crisis between the non-teaching staff and the university management.
The mandate schedule for payment of universities earned allowance dated January 8, obtained by Daily Sun reads: ”You are hereby authorised to debit the Revitalization of Universities Infrastructure Account and credit the underlisted universities.”
Breakdown of the amount revealed that UNN got N2, 892, 952billion, N2.1billion for academic staff and 723,238million for three non-teaching staff, ABU received N2,660,525billion, N1.995billion went to ASUU members, three non-academic workers shared N665,331million while UNICAL got N2,345,942billion made up of N1.759,456billion for teaching staff and N586,485million for non-academic staff.
University of Ibadan received N2, 118,903billion, ASUU UI members got N1,589,177billion, non- teaching workers picked N529,725million, University of Lagos was credited with N1,892,036billion, academic staff shared N1, 419, 027billion, non-teaching workers got N473,009million, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife was credited with N1,852,253billion, members of ASUU got N1,389,189billion, non-teaching staff received N463,063million, University of Benin share is N2, 329,901billion, teaching staff pocketed N1,747,426billion while three non-academic workers got N582,475million.
Others are University of Jos was credited with N1, 741,607billion, the UNIJOS ASUU members shared N1,306,205billion, their non-academic counterpart got N435,401million, University of Ilorin received N1,526,602billion, teaching staff received N1,144,952billion, three non-academic workers shared N381,650million, University of Abuja got N831,534million, its teaching staff received N623,650million, non-academic unions shared N207,883million, Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta secured N850,224million, ASUU members got N637,668million, non-teaching workers got N212,556million and University of Agriculture, Makurdi received N986,789million, its academic staff pocketed N740,092million and three non-teaching N246,697million.
SSANU UNILAG branch in a statement said the union have lost confidence in the earned allowance sharing committee headed by a professor for entitlement belonging to non-teaching workers.
It reads: ”The committee on sharing of earned allowance should henceforth be headed and populated by competent members of the non-teaching staff. Members of SSANU are enjoined to maintain peace and go about their normal duties with the assurance that justice would prevail.”
The union explained that the Vice Chancellor of UNILAG, Prof. Oluwatoyin Ogundipe has been informed of congress resolution for appropriate action.
The three non-teaching staff in the Nigerian University System had earlier rejected the allocation of 75 percent of the N40billion earned allowance to academic staff while they got 25 percent.