Sani represented Kaduna Central Senatorial District on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 8th Assembly.
Former Nigerian lawmaker, Senator Shehu Sani, has berated the Nigerian government for paying members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) half salaries for the month of October after the union called off its eight months’ strike.
Sani represented Kaduna Central Senatorial District on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the 8th Assembly.
Sani asked why President Muhammadu Buhari who is seeing his doctors in London, UK is paid in full while the lecturers were not paid in full, in a tweet on Sunday.
He said other political office holders who do not work every day are not paid based on the number of days they worked but university lecturers are paid half salaries on a “no work, no pay” policy.
“The President is in London and he is paid. No political office holder is paid based on the days he worked. Pay University lecturers their full wages,” Sani said.
“Denying ASUU their full salary is more of vengeance and less of compliance with the laws of strikes,” he added in a tweet on Monday.
The government only paid the university lecturers half their salaries for October after the union called off the strike which started on February 14 over the government’s failure to meet its demands. The demands included improved university funding.
Following the controversy the payment of half salaries to the lecturers has generated, the Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment in a statement quoted by some media organisations said, “Following the ruling of the Court of Appeal, which upheld the order of the National Industrial Court of Nigeria, asking ASUU to go back to work, the leadership of the union wrote to the minister, informing him that they have suspended the strike. The Federal Ministry of Education wrote to him in a similar vein and our labour inspectors in various states also confirmed that they have resumed work.
“So, the minister wrote to the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and Planning, directing that their salaries should be restored. They were paid in pro-rata for the number of days that they worked in October, counting from the day that they suspended their industrial action. Pro-rata was done because you cannot pay them for work not done. Everybody’s hands are tied.”