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Nigeria: FG Has No Business With Teachers - Minister
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Daily Trust (Abuja)
24 July 2008
Posted to the web 24 July 2008
Abdulfattah Olajide & Abdullahi M. Gulloma
The Federal Government has no business negotiating with the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) over the ongoing nationwide teachers' strike since it has no teachers in its service, Minister of Education Professor Igwe Aja-Nwachukwu said in Abuja yesterday. The minister spoke along with his Information and Communication counterpart after the Federal Executive Council meeting at the State House.
The Education minister argued that the teachers in the Unity Schools owned by the Federal Government are not teachers but civil servants. He said the Unity School teachers are not members of the NUT since they don't pay check-off dues to the union. He said the federal teachers pay their check-off dues to the civil service union instead.
According to the minister, negotiations over the teachers' demand for a new Teachers Salary Scale (TSS) should be between the NUT and state governments. He reiterated that the Federal Government has no constitutional right to negotiate teachers' salary on behalf of state governments.
Professor Aja-Nwachukwu said the Unity School teachers have since been shunning the NUT strike because they are not members of the union. He urged the NUT to call off the strike and negotiate with the various state governments.
Also speaking at the briefing, Information Minister John Odey said the government has approved the award of various contracts worth about N1billion for the upgrade of facilities at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, which is billed to host the Nigeria University Games next March.
"For the university to successfully host the game, it needs to upgrade and improve on its existing facilities as well as construct new ones. The facilities to be upgraded are located at the Enugu and Nsukka campuses of the university", he said.
Meanwhile, the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT) has denied statements by the Minister of Education, Mr. Igwe Aja Nwachukwu, that teachers in Unity Schools are not check-off dues paying members of the union.
"What they are doing in Unity Schools is teaching and as teachers they pay check-off dues to NUT as an umbrella body of primary and secondary school teachers in the country," he said.
NUT spokesperson, Comrade Hussaini Zakari Tilde, said the minister's statement was a propaganda and diversionary tactic to weaken the agitation of teachers for the implementation of the Teachers Salary Structure (TSS).
He said teachers will continue the ongoing nationwide strike until the federal government issues the enabling circular for the payment of TSS.
Already, NUT officials are discussing in Kaduna with the Secretaries to the State Governments of the 19 Northern states on the TSS in order to find amicable ways of resolving the problem.
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The NUT officials are also billed to meet the Governors of the 19 Northern states on the TSS matter.
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