IPPIS: Are you trying to sustain a corruption-riddled system? BMO quizzes ASUU

The Buhari Media Organisation (BMO) has described the opposition of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to the full implementation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) as corruption fighting back.

BMO warned ASUU not to allow itself be seen as a saboteur of a scheme that was bound to weed out ghost workers and improve the efficiency of payroll adminstration in public universities.

In a statement signed on Tuesday by its Chairman, Niyi Akinsiju, and Secretary, Cassidy Madueke, BMO cautioned the union to avoid any action that could truncate smooth academic exercise nationwide just to protest President Muhammadu Buhari’s insistence on full IPPIS.

The group recalled how the scheme had, since 2017, saved the country over N230bn that could have gone into private pockets through fictitious payment of salaries and pensions.

It said it was surprising that a group seen as a collection of intellectuals was at the forefront of the opposition to its full implementation, on the ground that it will erode the autonomy of the university system and the peculiarities of their earned allowances.

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“So, can one say that ASUU is threatening a showdown in order to blackmail the government to sustain a corruption-riddled system that has over the years cost the country several billions of naira.

“This is not a good development and we wonder what the University lecturers are really up to with what can easily be interpreted as a blatant endorsement of corruption.”

BMO further accused ASUU of mobilising its members for a strike even when records showed that the Federal Government had agreed to take the peculiarities of the university system into consideration.

“We also know for a fact that the AGF told the unions that the centralised payroll would be prepared by individual universities and that the human resources element would be taken care of by them.

“So why would only ASUU, out of all the unions, then claim that the autonomy of Universities is bound to be eroded?”, BMO quizzed.

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