BEVERLY HILLS, October 06, (THEWILL) – Secondary School teachers in Kwara state have pulled out of the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT). The teachers, under the aegis of Academic Staff Union of Secondary Schools (ASUSS) hinged their action on the basis of different employers.
Chairman of ASUSS, Mallam Jimoh Daudu made this known at a lecture organized to mark the 2020 World Teachers Day in Ilorin.
Daudu said their membership of the NUT was “a marriage of inconvenience, hence the need to split out to better agitate and make the demand for their peculiar challenges. ASUSS belongs to the state government while NUT belongs to Local Government Councils and Federal Government. NUT members are predominantly employed by local government councils and the Federal Government; while states pay teachers of secondary schools. Since the employers are different, the aspirations will also differ. If there is a problem, NUT cannot shoulder our problem. For instance, some teachers were sent out of their job by the state government during the Bukola Saraki administration for spending eight years on a step. But this did not affect teachers in primary schools because they were never employed by the state.”
The ASUSS leader said that with their struggle, the state government was forced to include secondary school teachers on the list of those who could proceed to Grade Level 17 before retirement. These teachers, he said, retired on Grade Level 15 before the intervention of ASUSS. “That is why we say we are to be on a parallel line with them. Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) was with NUT before they left, College of Education Academic Staff Union (COEASU) was with them before they left them. The same thing was the Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic (ASUP). It is the right time for us to leave also”, he added.
In his remark, Mr Ezekiel Adegoke, the Acting Chairman of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in the state, to which the ASUSS is affiliated, urged the state government to accede to the demand of the labour union on the implementation of the N30,000 new minimum wage. This, he said, is to avert the impending strike action proposed by workers in the state as it would be an ill wind that does not benefit the two parties.
Adegoke, however, commended the state government for appointing teachers as Commissioner for Education and Chairman of the State Teaching Service Commission.
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