By Ajuzieogu Chukwuebuka (Abia Writers)
Edited by Livingrich Ezeikpe
Academic activities were on Monday grounded at the Abia State Polytechnic Aba, as staff and students of the institution held a peaceful protest against 11 months salary arrears. The demonstration which took place at the main entrance of the Polytechnic, along Aba-Owerri expressway caused serious gridlock as the protesting staff and their students brandished placards with inscriptions such as “Mr. Rector pay me my 11 months salary”.
In an interview with Comrade Nwachukwu Chucks, the president of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Polytechnics (SSANIP), Abia State Chapter, he accused the polytechnic management of punishing them and their families by allegedly using the subventions released to them by the state government to pay contractors handling projects in the state. He noted that “This morning, we are kick-starting our industrial actions to drive home our demand for the payment of our unpaid 11 months salary.
We were last paid in April 2017, “Since April 2017, no worker in Abia Poly has received any money as salary. Our union dues for 14 months, which was deducted from source, was not remitted to the union. The management converted it into private use; also cooperative dues, which were also deducted from members’ salaries were also converted by the same management into their own use.
The most annoying part of all these issues is that the Abia State government graciously gave 2months subventions of the Paris Refund to the management of this institution, but instead of them to use it to pay suffering workers; they used the money to pay contractors handling projects within the school, so as to have their cut of it”. Chucks noted further, “we have been patient enough. After sending notice to the management, instead of them to respond to the issue they resorted to the use of violence and intimidation.
They used the money that could have been used as part of the salaries to invite the army. Will the Army drive the hunger in our stomachs? Will they send our children who are out of school back to school? Landlords have ejected most of us out of our houses. We can’t pay our medical bills and yet we work every day in this polytechnic. We are saying no. It’s either they pay us or we stop working. We are using this opportunity to call on the state government to do something serious, including, (i) is to release more money to clear off more backlogs of our salaries; (ii) is to probe this present management to ascertain how they have been managing this school since 2017 that they were appointed.”
They want to use that to molest and intimidate us. This action has made us angry. I took the Rector to House of Assembly and over there; he openly said that the government is doing good, that they have released all the subventions to the institution to the tune of January this year. So, why are we being owed? We are here on the streets to let the public know that we are fade up. We are frustrated. We are not going to work again.”
Some of the students who were in solidarity with the lecturers called on the state government to intervene and save their academics which would suffer because of the strike. According to Princess, a Final Year Student of Public Administration, “This is 11 months that our lecturers have not been paid. We have paid our school fees, our departmental fees and every other necessary bill they demanded from us, yet, they have not paid our lecturers this is very unfair.
Almost All the students have paid their fees and still, they’ve not paid these lecturers, who have been teaching us since this semester”. Princess lamented that “They’ve got families too. We are supposed to be writing our exams, but we cannot do that now because they are going on strike”. She called on the management to pay their lecturers or call them to a roundtable discussion. She requested the state government should do something about the situation, as their exams ought to start on 22nd of April 2018.
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