National Executive Council of the Senior Staff Association of Nigeria Universities has threatened to embark on a nationwide strike if their meeting with the Federal Government fails to address their demands.
The union is asking for payment of the Earned Allowance and rejection of the NEEDs Assessment Report in universities.
SSANU President, Mr. Samson Ugwoke, on Friday after the union's NEC meeting at the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomosho, said the university workers would commence a nationwide strike if the meeting with the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Pius Anyim, failed to address the issues in contention.
Ugwoke said the strike had been delayed as a result of the intervention of the House of Representatives.
He, however, lamented that despite the meeting, the fund required for the payment was not captured in the 2013 budget.
He said, "All the (university) unions were together at a meeting on the invitation of House Committee on Education. The committee invited us and a motion of urgent importance was moved.
"Our meeting with them was very robust, interesting and successful. At the end, the House suggested that the executive should raise a supplementary budget covering the Earned Allowance.
"To our surprise, the National University Commission decided to write that it will take N157bn. We said it is not true. How they came about that figure was not clear to us. We were not carried along.
"We were surprised to read in the newspapers that some members of ASUU and the NUC went to the Chairman, Senate Committee on Education, Senator Uche Chukwumerije, to
present N157bn as money needed for the payment.
"We have waited enough for the supplementary budget. At the meeting with the Federal Government, we expect a definite
answer on the payment of Earned Allowance. Anything short of that, the NEC mandated us to declare a total strike action."
