THE PURPORTED FG-ASUU AGREEMENT!!!
The reader is warned that this piece contains the
implied opinion of the writer. The reader is also free
to draw conclusions.
Thanks to Qawiy Temitope for this excellent piece, I
am much indebted.
ASUU Part Quatre: We Have An Agreement
Before you complain that Peter Jackson’s Lord of
The Rings only had 3 parts,
I have 2 words for you – The Hobbit.
First of all, shout out to the good man who dug up
this agreement, scanned
it and emailed it to me. As we say here in Blighty;
you Sir, are the dog’s
bollocks. Thank you.
I think the first thing that struck me about this
agreement is how strong
ASUU are as a union. I wonder how other unions will
feel if they see the
kind of stuff ASUU managed to extract from
government. Part of the reason
for this, in my opinion, is immediately obvious
when you look at the list of
the people who negotiated for both sides. While the
ASUU delegation was
led by its President and senior members, the
government side was led by
Gamaliel Onosode and some other Professors and
ex Pro-Chancellors. The
highest ranking members of the negotiating team
from the government side
appear to be some civil servants who acted as
‘observers’.
This is not to invalidate the agreement of course –
the government clearly
signed it so they should honour it. But when you
look at the composition of
people purportedly negotiating on behalf of the
government, ASUU were
already 1 nil up even before anything was signed.
Does anyone know why
things were done this way? Was it that relations
between government and
ASUU had broken down to the point where they
couldn’t sit round a table
and trash out the issues? Not even a minister?
To the agreement proper – there were 4 main issues
to be negotiated
namely 1) Conditions of service [salaries] 2)
Funding 3) University autonomy
and freedom 4) ‘Other matters’.
Here are the highlights of the agreement as I saw
them
1. ASUU asked for and got a special salary structure
for themselves called
Consolidated University Academic Salary Structure
II (CONUASS). This
CONUASS was further made up of 3 components –
1) CONUASS I [the
previous one from 2007] 2) Consolidated Peculiar
University Academic
Allowances [CONPUAA] 3) Rent.
The CONPUAA was apparently to capture all the
other allowances that they
wanted but not captured in the CONUASS. Stay with
me. The reason why
they were allowed this was because the committee
agreed that ‘Nigerian
academics represent the critical mass of scholars in
the society’ and as a
result of this they ‘deserved unique conditions that
will motivate them [...]
to attain greater efficiency’.
2. In exchange for this new pay, ASUU agreed to be
of good behaviour and
not do anything that disrupts the academic calendar
to get whatever it
wants i.e. no striking.
3. Next thing they did was to look at the countries
where Nigerian
academics frequently migrated to e.g Botswana,
Ghana and other developed
countries. Based on this they came up with a salary
structure that would
prevent this kind of brain drain. They called this
Table 1. The highest salary
anyone could earn based on this table was N7.5m
per annum.
But ASUU then seemingly looked at the
government’s condition and took
pity on them because the government didn’t have a
lot of money and then
gave them some sort of ‘discount’. This gave birth
to Table 2 in which the
highest possible salary was N6m. The cynic in me
thinks this was simply a
clever negotiating tactic but I wasn’t there.
4. As far as I am aware from all of ASUU’s
statements since the strike began,
the government has complied with this CONUASS
salary structure. Indeed it
will be difficult for the government to not pay them
the salary they agreed
to. It is the next bit that seems to have caused all
the problems and it’s
easy to see why.
Something called Earned Academic Allowances was
also agreed to by both
parties. In essence, this was supposed to be a kind
of piece-rate payment
where ASUU members as academic staff were paid
a fixed amount for each
unit of work they did. So for supervising
postgraduate students, a Professor
was to be paid N25,000 per student while a Lecturer
1 and Senior Lecturer
were to be paid N15,000 and N20,000 per student
respectively.
For Teaching Practice/Industrial Supervision/Field
Trips, a Professor was
entitled to N100,000 per annum. Further, if a
Professor did more than one
field trip in a year, he would be paid separately for
each one. Even though
this money was for field trips, such an academic
staff would be entitled to
mileage and overnight allowance in line with
government regulations. It’s
unclear why, after being paid N100,000 for a field
trip, the same person will
then be entitled to mileage and overnight
allowance. What is the definition
of ‘field trip’ I wonder?
There was also Honoraria for helping to conduct
exams internally or
externally ranging from N45,000 for Master’s to
N105,000 for Doctorate. For
moderating external undergraduate or postgraduate
exams, there was a
separate honoraria ranging from N60,000 for 50
undergraduate students to
N80,000 for more than 10 postgraduate students.
To encourage young academics to ‘further’,
postgraduate study grants were
to be given – N350,000 per session (up to a
maximum of 2 sessions) for a
science based masters and N500,000 per session
(up to a maximum of 4
sessions) for a science based doctorate. The figures
were N250,000 and
N350,000 respectively for non science studies.
I am not too familiar with the intricacies of
academia but another N200,000
was to be paid to external assessors for the position
of Reader and
Professor. Call duty and clinical hazard allowances
were to be paid to those
who qualified to them per existing government
regulations.
It is unclear what a Responsibility Allowance is (at
least to me) but a Vice
Chancellor and Librarian were entitled to N750,000
per annum for this
allowance while ‘all other officers’ were entitled to
N150,000.
Excess Workload Allowance was to be paid per hour
to teaching staff ranging
from N2,000 per hour for a Graduate Assistant to
N3,500 per hour for a
Professor.
You can see the problem with these allowances –
there is no way for the
government to know how much they will cost in
advance. They could cost
N10bn or they could cost N100bn. Lecturers would
simply submit the bills
and the government would have to cough up the
money. You can also see
that ASUU played a clever hand by giving the
government a ‘discount’ on
the base salaries while loading up with all sorts of
allowances elsewhere.
For a lecturer earning say N3m per annum, it wont
take much for he/she to
earn an extra say 50% of that salary through all
these allowances. The
government isn’t there on the campus so it will
simply get the bill to pay.
And I have not even mentioned corruption.
5. There were other non-salary benefits in the
agreement as well. Each
academic staff was entitled to a car loan equivalent
to his/her annual salary
charged at 2% for administrative cost (stop
laughing). They were also
entitled to a car refurbishment loan for those who
wanted to refurbish their
old cars, again charged at 2%. At least with a car
loan you get to see the
new car if you want to, but refurbishment? That’s
just money in the bush.
For housing loans, each academic was entitled to 8
times his/her annual
salary to buy a house. After 6 years service, an
academic would be entitled
to a sabbatical leave. If this sabbatical was abroad,
the university would pay
the ‘transport’ costs for the academic, a spouse and
up to 4 children. If
hospitalised, an academic would be entitled to 6
months paid sick leave
which could be extended for another 6 months.
Retirement age was increased from 65 to 70 and
any one who retired as a
Professor would be entitled to a pension equivalent
to his/her final salary.
Indeed even if the Professor retired before the
retirement age of 70, he
would still be entitled to the final salary pension
provided he had served as
a Professor for 15 years in a university.
University staff and their spouses as well as up to 4
children under the age
of 18 were entitled to health insurance. There are
various other benefits in
the agreement but these are mainly standard stuff
like maternity and 26
days leave.
What I find interesting is that while the section on
pay was quite specific in
what university staff were entitled to, as soon as
you get to the other
sections, everything turns to a ‘recommendation’.
So for example it was
recommended that the government spend N472bn
on the universities in
2009, N498bn in 2010 and N549bn in 2011.
Somehow, the Federal
Government was also supposed to fund the State
Universities (at least
recommended to) on a per student basis i.e. N3.7m
per student in total
from 2009 to 2011.
Another recommendation was for the state and
federal governments to
spend a minimum of 26% of their budgets on
education. Of this amount, at
least 50% was to be allocated to universities. Bear
in mind that this was a
negotiation between ASUU and the FG – the primary
and secondary school
interests were not represented there but ASUU was
effectively making a
recommendation on how much they should get from
the budget. In all this,
there are 1.2m students in our universities while we
need to find a way to
get 10.5m children into school.
It was also recommended that the Education Tax
Fund be changed to a
Higher Education Fund i.e. solely for the
universities, polytechnics and
colleges of education. This would be hilarious if it
wasn’t so scandalous –
after taking 50% of the budget, the universities
were to take 100% of the
ETF as well. You couldn’t make it up but then, when
you start negotiations
from the premise that there is a critical mass of
nation transforming
scholars in our universities, this is not a surprise. I
wonder if the mumu
NUT who are threatening to go on strike in solidarity
with ASUU know that
ASUU don’t really give a toss about them.
Universities were also to access the Petroleum
Technology Development Fund
(PTDF) for the training and development of their
staff i.e. more money for
ASUU and government was to grant universities
duty-free importation rights
for educational materials. Given that even our
churches have been known to
terribly abuse such waivers in the past, this is
amusing to say the least.
Where the agreement descends into outright farce
is when it reaches the
section on autonomy. Having demanded and
obtained all the above things
from the government, ASUU then proceeded to add
insult to injury by asking
that university autonomy and academic freedom
should be ‘enhanced and
protected’. Note that this agreement wasn’t exactly
reached with smiles and
good-natured banter – it came after a strike that
eventually forced the
government to the negotiating table. So ASUU were
not only asking the
government to give them as much money as they
could demand with a
straight face, they were asking to be left alone to
spend it and run their
affairs as they wish ranging from changing the laws
impeding university
independence to allowing them admit students as
they saw fit. You want
the government to look after you and your family
by paying everything you
want and you want the same government to grant
you freedom and
autonomy. Eh?
As I’ve said several times before – this dispute is all
about pay and nothing
else. The thing with recommendations is that they
are just that;
recommendations. You cant take someone to court
for not following a
recommendation. So it was up to the government to
follow those parts of the
agreement or not. But ASUU weren’t messing about
with the parts that
concerned them. The numbers were clearly
specified which is why today
they can say the government is owing them N92bn
in earned allowances or
whatever the figure is. It is also the same reason
why the government feels
it can throw N30bn at them and ask them to
‘manage’ it. Afterall its ASUU’s
word against the government’s.
You hardly come across the word ‘student’ in the
agreement at all. And
there is nothing specific about infrastructure in
there other than the large
sums of money the government was supposed to
give the universities. There
are many people today making ignorant noises
about government ‘honouring
the agreement’ and even coming up with things that
are not in said
agreement as ‘ASUU’s demands’. There really isnt
anything for anyone in
here other than ASUU so personally I’d say, leave
them to fight it out with
government.
Who in Nigeria wont like free medical insurance for
their family? This is why
I get confused when the whole debate about
education comes down to pay.
Even if we had the best universities in the world,
there will still be a case
for paying our lecturers more. 99.9% of humans
beings, when asked if they
wanted more pay, will respond ‘Yes’. So why
exactly is this the pillar on
which the arguement always rests?
You can also see the sinister side of ASUU in the
draft amendment bill with
the way they were eager to tightly regulate the
private universities via the
NUC to protect themselves… going as far as
recommending up to 5 year jail
terms with no option of fine for anyone who so
much as uses his property for
the operation of an unapproved university.
Be that as it may, I think the government should
honour this agreement. It
should pay every last penny. That is the only way it
might learn a lesson for
the future. How you can send a team of ex-
academics to negotiate with a
team of academics on your behalf is beyond me.
But hey, I don’t know what
went down in those days. Once this strike is over,
prepare for the next one
because as sure as night follows day, it will come.
Ultimately this document shows the impossibility of
reaching an ‘agreement’
after one party has forced a negotiation via hostage
taking. There is
absolutely no way in this life or the next we are
going to have anything
approaching education reform until we break out of
this death spiral of
strikes and pay deals. The conversation we need to
have has not even
begun at all. My suggestion will be that the
government should just pay
ASUU whatever it is it wants right now and then
begin talks on university
reform i.e. the lecturers need to be in class when
negotiations start. That
way, we can know what everyone really wants.

Culled from the fb group of the SUG UI.

hahahahahahahahahaha....omo c agreement na...e clear say na nw government knw say dem don enta ''1 chance''........dis is nt even an agreement...it is a wishlist 4rm ASUU....lets hope dat nxt tym d government will negotiate wit deir heads intact

I always knew ASUU made quite a number of unreasonable and greedy requests, but I wonder what the FG were thinking when they agreed it.



This is what happens when one signs a contract without looking at it.

bt som of d tins ASUU claimed here were jus recomendations from ASUU! God save us all. Amen