By Gabriel Dike
Academic Staff Union of Polytechnics (ASUP), yesterday, the Federal Government should be held accountable if polytechnic lecturers resume the suspended industrial action.
ASUP, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Abdullahi Yalwa, said members at the 16th National Delegates Conference (NDC) at Asaba, Delta State, reviewed progress made by the union in its engagements with owners of public polytechnics and monotechnics and the state of the nation with emphasis on the economy and security.
He said the union frowned at government’s failure to fulfil its own end of the agreement leading to the April 2021 Memorandum of Understanding signed to end ASUP strike.
He said the NDC renewed demands for immediate release of the approved N15 billion revitalisation fund and 10 months arrears of minimum wage owed lecturers in federal polytechnics.
Yalwa disclosed the NDC condemned the breach of the 2019 Polytechnic Act in many federal polytechnics and also the failure of state governments to domesticate the Act.
“The conference called on the institutions to abide by the provisions of the Act and also appealed to state governments to fast-track the domestication of the Act to align with the governance of their institutions with acceptable standards.”
He said the NDC commended the establishment of six Centres of Excellence in the six polytechnics by the Tertiary Education Trust Fund and tasked the agency to ensure they are monitored to achieve the desired impact in the sector.