ASUU President, Prof Emmanuel Osodeke stated, ‘‘Whenever ASUU is on strike, it is not about state ASUU or federal ASUU. We have one ASUU representing all universities in the country; those schools that are not participating in the strike are not our members.
‘‘The issue of salary should be left to the union to decide because when there was minimum wage adjustment, both federal and state schools were a part of it; even TETFund, it funds both state and federal institutions. Do we have a federal NUC or state NUC?
‘’The issue of salary negotiation is exclusive to the union. If a state can increase it, good; but we have one university system in Nigeria, and the state cannot even pay lesser than what the Federal Government is paying.’’
Commenting on the controversy, Ekiti State Commissioner for Information, Akin Omole, said on Wednesday that the state was not part of the ongoing negotiation between the FG and ASUU, hence, any agreement reached could not be binding on it as far as ASUU members in Ekiti State University were concerned.
Omole said, “If Ekiti State must have any dialogue at all, it can only be with the ASUU in EKSU. The ASUU negotiation with the Federal Ministry of Labour and Federal Ministry of Education is not done with the concurrence of Ekiti State Government. It is a national issue and it is the FG that is involved.
“With the principle of federalism, it is the employer and the employee that determine the pay. The salaries of workers in all states of the federation are not the same, then the issue is that what happens in another state cannot be binding on them.”
Likewise, the Benue State Commissioner of Information, Culture and Tourism, Michael Inalegwu said the state government was not involved in the ongoing negotiation between the FG and the university lecturers.
While acknowledging the lean resources of the state, the commissioner said that any agreement reached between the FG and ASUU may have serious consequences on the resources of the state but expressed optimism that both the state government and the state chapter of ASUU would reach a compromise.
He said, “The Benue State Government is not involved in the negotiation; whatever agreement they reached may not be binding on us because they are different structures. But you should know that our state government places its lecturers in the state university at par with their counterparts at the federal level.”