Strike: I won”t sack protesting workers, FUOYE”s VC assures

The Vice Chancellor of the Federal University, Oye Ekiti (FUOYE), Ekiti State, Prof. Kayode Soremekun, has promised not to victimize any of the union leaders who led protest against the management of the school on Monday. He, however, warned that the management would not also tolerate any act of lawlessness by unions, alleging that many […]

The Vice Chancellor of the Federal University, Oye Ekiti (FUOYE), Ekiti State, Prof. Kayode Soremekun, has promised not to victimize any of the union leaders who led protest against the management of the school on Monday.

He, however, warned that the management would not also tolerate any act of lawlessness by unions, alleging that many of the academic staff who didn’t join the protest were beaten by the protesters.

The leaders of the Senior Staff Union of Universities (SSANU) and Non-Academic Staff Union(NASU) , who led the protest over unpaid November and December salaries and non-payment of hazard allowance, also accused the management of  withdrawing N2 million each to celebrate the Christmas, among other grievous allegations bordering on illegal employment and stagnant  promotion.

But contrary to the allegation that the university’s development has reduced under him, Soremekun disclosed that  he has taken bold steps to  expand the internally generated revenue of the university as well as shoring up the number of courses from 30 to 49 with the recent accreditation of 19 more courses by the National Universities Commission(NUC).

The Vice Chancellor  clarified  that contrary to position canvassed by the rampaging unions , that the November salary has been paid before the New year, while that of December was paid today after getting the credit facility from the federal government on Monday.

Speaking   in Ado Ekiti on the crisis, Soremekun said his major preoccupation is how to develop the university and not to witch-hunt anybody on account of legitimate agitations.

Soremekun denied engaging in arbitrary award of contracts and pilfering of the institution’s money for selfish motives, saying the university has a strong Public Procurement Act and Financial and General Purposes Committee to scrutinize all dealings being undertaken by the management.

"As much as we are not going to victimize anybody, we will not also tolerate any act of lawlessness by unions, because we learnt many of the academic staff who didn’t join the protest were beaten. This was not good for academic environment and we will not allow that.

"We have paid the outstanding salaries and what we expect is for them to resume work. The idea that all allowances must be paid before resumption is not realizable now. But I want to appeal to them to see reason to allow for speedy settlement of  this crisis", he said.

The VC added: "The federal government has set up Wale Babalakin-led committee to dialogue with university workers and I expect them to await the outcome of the committee.

"The FG dialogue with university workers in 2009 and they appealed to universities with strong IGR to pay the hazard allowance. But what IGR can a university like FUOYE, which established five years ago makes?

"We are just trying to expand the scope by creating more courses to accommodate more youths and boost our revenue to be able to pay", he clarified.

The VC lamented that the university is 24 hours hooked to generating set for effective power supply in the university, which cost a sum of N10 million monthly, saying he has signed agreement with Benin Electricity Distribution Company to link  the school  with the grid and reduce dependence on costly alternative power source.