STRIKE: ASUU ATBU says 600 of its members were not paid salaries

It has been disclosed that not fewer than 600 members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), ATBU, Bauchi branch were not paid their salaries during the 2020 national strike action.

They are a substantial part of the College of Medical Sciences, especially those in Biochemistry and outside the clinicals.

The disclosure was made by the ATBU ASUU branch Chairperson, Dr Ibrahim Ibrahim Inuwa while fielding questions from Journalists shortly after addressing a press conference at the ASUU Secretariat, in ATBU, Yelwa campus.

He said that, “Virtually, all members that are not part of the College of the Medical Sciences were not paid. We have a substantial number of our members in the College of Medical Sciences who were also not paid.”

Asked why ASUU was just speaking about something that happened last year, he said that, “When that information was reeled out to the Nigerian public, as a Union, we didn’t just act out of emotions, we had to set up a committee which did one or two preliminary investigations to confirm if that was true.”

The ASUU Branch Chairperson stressed that, “In fact, we got the Secretary of MDCAN who happens to be a lecturer in the University here and we engaged him and they dissociated themselves that nothing like that happened and said that they were on strike.”

READ ALSO: ASUU rejects NUC designed curriculum, warns against erosion of varsities’ autonomy

He reiterated the position of the union that MDCAN, as an association, has Consultants that are not lecturers in the university but are employed with the Teaching Hospital.

According to him, “Some are Consultants that are outsourced to come and conduct part of medical training in the Teaching Hospital. So it took time for us to unravel this.”

On the Union wants now, Ibrahim Ibrahim Inuwa said that, “Chris Ngige, in his position as a Minister, all his presentation and actions are supposed to be documented as part of what the next Minister will take over and I have a generic view about what happened, so it’s good for us to get the records straight.”

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