President Muhammadu Buhari-led government has condemned the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU over issues concerning the seven-month strike.
The federal government on Sunday described the issue concerning the strike by the union as confusing.
The Minister of State for Education, Emeka Nwajiuba, during an interview with Punch accused ASUU of muddling their reason for the strike around the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System.
The Union while reacting to the allegations noted that FG wants to turn Nigerians against university lecturers.
There were indications few weeks back that the union would end the strike and the Federal Government would adopt the University Transparency Account System, which ASUU developed as an alternative to the IPPIS.
However, all hope was dashed after ASUU and the government exchanged words on the payment system.
The Minister of State for Education, Nwajiuba, while condemning ASUU said, “We have a situation that is quite confusing because a lot of the issues are muddled up so you don’t know which one they (ASUU) want to address and which one they don’t want to address.”
He said government would not integrate ASUU’s payment system with the IPPIS until it is tested.
The minister stated, “If we are going to start adopting platforms from different groups, it will defeat the entire purpose for which we want to have a unified way of knowing how much we owe or due to pay at any time so that we can budget for it and plan for it. They (ASUU) said no, they had a system that they would like to develop, government said, ‘go ahead develop any system, it is not a problem.”
