The Federal Government has commenced payment of salary arrears to some University lecturers, However, a source from the Nnamdi Azikiwe University who spoke to journalists in Abuja on Wednesday said the government was selective in the payment of the varsity lecturers as only medical lecturers were being paid their withheld salaries as of the time.
The source told The PUNCH that only lecturers in the departments of Basic Medical Sciences, Basic Clinical Sciences and Medicine across some federal universities are being attended while others are yet to be settled.
The lecturers are under the Nigerian Association of Medical and Dental Academics, one of the two splinter groups licensed by the government to reduce the influence of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU),
It could be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari’s government had in 2022, implemented a no-work-no-pay rule against lecturers for seven months due to the strike embarked upon by the ASUU.
Efforts to get the government to pay the lecturers the withheld salaries for the duration of the strike by ASUU proved abortive. But the Medical and Dental Consultants Association of Nigeria, a body which encompasses medical doctors in academics and other consultant medical doctors, explained to the government that medical schools were not shut down during the period of the strike; hence the salaries of their members should not be withheld.
“This is currently causing confusion in the school. Medical lecturers have started receiving their salaries. Other lecturers have not but we have been told to stay calm,” the source who pleaded to remain anonymous told journalists today.
“It is true, medical lecturers who worked during the time of strike have started receiving theirs,” another medical lecturer at the University of Maiduguri was quoted to have said.
