Academic activities in the Federal University Oye- Ekiti were yesterday paralyzed as workers trooped out to protest poor treatment from the school authority.
The protesters included both academic and non-academic staff of the institution. They matched out as early as 7 am singing solidarity songs as they barricaded the Ado-Ikole-Omuo-Lokoja exit road leading to Abuja. This resulted in a traffic snarl which saw travelers taking alternative routes for their journey.
While their demonstration lasted, the Vice-Chancellor of the University, Prof. Isaac Asuzu, as well as other senior officials stayed away from the school premises as the irked staffers set up a bonfire on the access road leading to the school.
The protesters called on President Goodluck Jonathan and the Minister of education, Ibrahim Shakarau, to investigate the finances of the university as they accused the Vice-Chancellor and the Bursar of not ensuring transparency.
Some inscriptions on the placards they carried read: “Pay all our allowances for the community to benefit”; “This is neo-colonialism, enough is enough”; “No to anti-transformation agenda”; “Remit to the government and pay our staff salaries”; “Asuzu must go”; “We are not slaves, Jonathan save us”.
According to the protesters’ spokesman, outrageous taxes were deducted from their salaries, adding that no worker had been promoted since the university was established about four years ago.
His words: “No to anti-transformational agenda. What is being done in this university runs contrary to the transformation agenda of President Goodluck Jonathan, but we are for President Jonathan and that is why we want him to wade into this matter without delay.
“Under normal circumstances, each senior staff ought to receive between N1.2 million to N1.5 million as relocation allowance as introduced by the Federal Government in 2007, but we were only paid N252, 000 in three installments when our agitations became so much.
“On the issue of hazard allowance, Ekiti State University has been enjoying it since 2008, but we were denied on the basis that the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA) was not paying. But nothing has so far been done even when FUTA has started paying.
“To end all these problems, we call on the university to implement the recommendations of the Prof Aganga-chaired committee, which stated that tax must no longer be based on consolidation but on basic salaries and the excess deductions refunded without delay.
“Again, the National Housing Scheme which the management has mandated should be made optional while all allowances being paid in Federal University, Otuoke, Bayelsa State and in Federal University, Lokoja, Kogi State and other Federal Universities established in 2011 should be paid without delay”, he said.
A staff of the university who gave his name as Ojo Foluso, alleged that the Vice-Chancellor would return N400 million to the Federal Ministry of Education as unspent subvention for 2014 this December, even when workers are suffering.
“It has been an established practice that a university will get 30 per cent of any amount returned to the Federal Government. So what they are trying to do is to get the money not minding if we are made to suffer or not,” he said.
Efforts to get the reactions of the Vice-Chancellor proved abortive as the University’s security men told reporters that the VC was not on seat.
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